


The Depth of You and Me

by WindraDeadZed



Series: New World Order [4]
Category: Fallout (Video Games), Fallout 4
Genre: AU: Jenny was a firefighter, AU: Nora was a firefighter, Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, Angst, Asexual Character, Budding PTSD, Cambridge, Chem Addiction, Confused feels, Drugged thoughts, F/M, Flashbacks, Friends to Lovers, Implied Drug Use, Mutual Pining, Rambled Typing, Roughly 8 month time skip since Your Good Neighbor, Scattered Thoughts, Triggers, Visceral, from bad to worse
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2017-04-27
Updated: 2018-10-12
Packaged: 2018-10-24 11:01:40
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence, Rape/Non-Con
Chapters: 5
Words: 20,868
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/10740372
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/WindraDeadZed/pseuds/WindraDeadZed
Summary: The dragon has lost her flame.Following her return from the Institute, Nora is seized by an existential crisis and does the only thing that appears rational: she runs from Nick, from the Castle, from everybody. Perhaps it's for the best. Attempting to understand Shaun and his organization by accepting his missions will probably not sit well with her comrades.But the detective is one entity that won't be shaken off. He rallies the posse and they comb the Commonwealth.When everything goes wrong after her Synth Retention quest and a new player enters the game, things quickly come boiling to a head.





	1. Run

**Author's Note:**

> Forgive my, ah, crude first chapter. It's been a minute since I last wrote. And I'm getting back into the swing of it.
> 
> Slow starter. Chapters will get progressively longer.

Averted gazes and lowered eyes in my presence. Brimming conversations fall short to silence. I'm keenly aware of this new sensation of ... _exile_. Unwelcoming. It was the same at school. Jenny's hand on mine was the only trace of warmth after _everything_ ... and the last since the teachers ushered me into the principal's office. Lectures from police officers, the shaking of many heads ... Dad's sudden appearance was meant to fill me with hope, but the abyss in his eyes only served to deepen the void in my chest.  
  
Disappointment.  
  
We ride to the South Boston police station in silence. I can't bear to look at him.  
  
My knuckles are still sore. Still red. In their rush to detain me, my teachers had failed to wash the blood from my hands.  
  
_________  
  
  
He should have known the second Nora returned from the Institute that she would not be the same. But Nick never imagined it would be _this_ bad.  
  
Encountering Brian Virgil in the Glowing Sea filled Nora's noggin with fresh ideas and a positively glowing drive to commit the acts, despite how impossible they'd seemed. _It was time to build a teleportation device_. Something straight out of a science-fiction novel, though Nick supposed he didn't have room to talk.  
  
Seeking assistance from the Brotherhood of Steel (suggested surprisingly, by the synth himself ) was out of the question. Their only other option was the Minutemen. Luckily for them, Sturges wasn't a brainless cod like dozens of other morons roaming the Commonwealth.  
  
But Sanctuary was overpopulating with migrant survivors looking for a place to call home. Leery about how the teleportation device would affect their safety, all eyes turned to a larger Minutemen landmark. Half a week of scouting and one bloody battle of gore and Mirelurk shells, the Castle had been reclaimed from the tenuous Queen of the Deep and thrust back into Minutemen control.  
  
Since that moment, Nora was practically glued to the settlement ... venturing out only to claim the necessary supplies to keep the project rolling (among other items essential for rebuilding the Castle walls in the meantime, because they weren't going to get anything done if Raiders kept blowing down the doors).  
  
Three weeks. Three weeks of guard work. Three weeks of hunting (MacCready was surprisingly adept at fishing and Dogmeat showed off his nose by tracking radstags) and cultivating life (Nick and Nora assisted in crop-building ... to which the synth detective admitted enjoyment in dirt-digging-drudgery). Three weeks of Preston Garvey, noting the budding cabin fever that was Nora's psyche, repeatedly kicking her 'off the island' to look into settlements in distress.  
  
Three weeks of hard labor during the day, and restless surveillance when the sun fell. MacCready always winked out an hour after dark. He and the rest of the growing community slept like babes nestled in a new, secure 'home'. But Nora ... she wouldn't so much as bat an eye. Blossoming into a fine insomniac, she and Nick jested about Preston's boisterous snores echoing down the stone halls or fell into steep conversation about events of eons passed. He tried hard to keep her from dwelling on the device's construction, prattling her ear off into the woman finally started nodding off (usually by 2 in the morning).  
  
Valentine wouldn't lie. When she finally drifted to sleep, he found the silence in her stead lonesome. But there was refreshment in watching her doze. He acted as her bodygaurd - and deterrent, when the waking Preston poked around about Minutemen business. He'd be damned if any of them woke her up after it took her so long to pass out.  
  
And then ...  
  
... Then it was done.  
  
A crowning nine-foot tall monstrosity that made even the robotic man feel tiny and insignificant.  
  
Nora all-but jumped at the opportunity to test it. Sturges pulled her back with the preaching of common sense. "We gotta give it a test run, girl," he insisted, shaking his head. "Don't want the General steppin' into a shack-sized landmine, ya hear? It wouldn't be right goin' and blowin' ya to smithereens after all you done."

The woman out of time bit back a sharp rebuke and nodded. Nick held her by the shoulder. As if that would comfort her somehow. Ever muscle beneath his coated fingers was tense enough to snap.

  
"Do you think it'll work?" she asked him in a strained whisper. A grimace. Responding to her own question: "No ... it's gotta."  
  
Sturges turned a dial. Preston threw a lantern onto the relay.  
  
"It'll work fine, doll." Nick doubted his own words. But crushing Nora's needlepoint-sized hope was something he couldn't bring himself to do. "You'll see."  
  
A switch was flipped.  
  
**_CRASH!_**  
  
Lightning. Bright and white and _thick_ and **_dangerous_** crashed into the earth from a clear sky. The force of impact was enough to knock the closest men and women away. And the heat pushed back those unaffected by the blast. Screaming. **Shouting**. A brief, searing, _blistering_ surge of _hothot **hot**_ that sent internal alarms blaring through his sensors - _Warning! Thermal damage alert! Please retreat to a safe distance!_  
  
It was nothing. Probably. Maybe a singed wire. It definitely had nothing to do with the gnawing fear steadily forming in his processors ... calculating Nora's rate of survival had she been standing _right there_ on the relay when the bolt hit and _oh boy_ , that number was _not_ good.  
  
When the dust settled and nerves calmed, all that was left of the lantern was ... _nothing_. No ash. No burn marks. Nothing to suggest it was even there to begin with. A quick survey in the courtyard to see if the object had been blown away resulted in _nothing_. Had the teleporter worked? Or had it straight up _obliterated_ the lantern?  
  
Nick dug for a cigarette. He puffed it down to the butt within a minute and turned to Nora. "Perhaps we should look into an ... _alternative_ , doll. We don't gotta do it this way."  
  
But her wolfish grin put the suggestion down. "This is it, Nick. _I **have**_ to do it this way."  
  
Disbelief. "It'll be _suicide_ \- "  
  
"It won't." Warmth upon his exposed metal digits. Blinking yellow orbs discovered his hand was touching his ruined extremity as normally as one might interlock fingers with the fingers of a living human. "Have some faith in me, Knickknack."  
  
________  
  
He should have gone with her.  
  
Hauled her off the Castle grounds and gone back to the Agency to rehash the possibilities of an Institute infiltration.  
  
_Anything_ but let her go into that _death machine **alone**_.  
  
In the days that followed, MacCready remained stalwart on the Castle's walls - for Nora was now his employer, and leaving her side meant he wouldn't be getting paid for his troubles. Preston was constantly circulating the courtyard, leaving briefly only to rest and refresh.  
  
Nick stayed poised beside the relay. Restless. The ground was littered with cigarette butts and empty packs. Every time he went to clean his mess up, the detective would become distracted with his thoughts and stand like a statue until the inclination to breath fire resulted in the movement of his willing hands. Other times he would pace ... force himself to make contact with Ellie to remind her he was still alive. Cases were no doubt building up. But he couldn't leave.  
  
So swept with relief was he when a lightning flash brought Nora _back_ that he didn't stop to observe her expression. Old Nick spurred his doppleganger's limbs into motion. They coiled about her (peculiarly rigid) form and pulled her (stiffly) against him. Joy filtered through sensors, pressed hard into his aged, tired vocalizer. "I'll be _damned_ , doll, ya did it!"  
  
She didn't respond. Not verbally. But after a second of hesitation he body leaned into his and her limp arms gripped his steel skeleton tightly enough to inhibit his breathing had he functioning lungs.  
  
The faintest whisper burst from her lips. So low. So small. So _petty_. "Nick ... Nick ... " Stuttering. Trying to form words that wouldn't come.  
  
Footsteps blew through the halls, down the stairs. Preston and the Minutemen heard the thunder and rolled onto the scene. Their appearance in the corner of their eyes drove Nora into unprecedented action. Her dainty hands on Nick's forearms, the woman gave him a shove - rough enough to knock him off balance, strong enough to drive her point across. Rejection like _disgust_ and Nick, perturbed by this motion, expected the emotion to be riddled across her face.  
  
But ...

 

Gone was the strongest woman he'd ever laid glowing eyes on. The fearsome lioness snarling and roaring and clawing to protect her lost cub was reduced to a meek shelter kitten that had been beaten into a corner one too many times. Lips always verging on a smile with perked cheeks were pulled downwards into a thin frown. Teal eyes sagged, shaded black with sleepless bags. A pale sallowness to her flesh - which hadn't been colorful _before_ but now bordered the appearance of a corpse.  
  
His observations of humans told him what to expect when something was wrong. He knew the glee of their happiness. Could detect the depths of their lies. Noted when they were in mourning.  
  
In particular, over the years ... understood the grief portrayed by those who reported their loved ones missing when Valentine returned with new that was far from joyous. Their demeanors snapped so quickly that one could almost hear the shattering of their soul.  
  
And this ... this _Nora_ was the spitting image of those poor sods.  
  
His human hand had reached for her, beckoning, "Doll - Nora - hey, what's happened?"  
  
There was a twitch arms. An itch to push forward, held back by will. Lips wobbled, parted, closed ... Eyes squeezed shut. She looked away as Preston rounded the corner, led by Dogmeat -  
  
And in a flash, she was _gone_. Not disappeared but breaking into a full _sprint_ out the Castle gates with Dogmeat on her heels and Preston calling after her. The ghost dame with platinum hair and her canine steward, delving into the the fading twilight to where not even the stars would find her.  


 

 


	2. UPDATE 2

Wait wait, hold on a second, stop!  
I've made a different decision.

I tried writing the other work, and hoo boy how it lacked structure compared to this one.  
So what I'm going to do INSTEAD is keep this work in progress. :) The series is back. Going to reread my stuff, collect my bearings, remember what I was writing.

And then back to it!  
Gun for a chapter next weekend!


	3. Synth Retention

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> 9-28-18: Revisions made.  
> Look for the next chapter next weekend (as this weekend is officially shot to hell!)

Jenny and I were 14 when we were _officially_ handed our junior firefighter equipment.

I say 'officially', because in truth we'd kind of been tagging along since we were old enough to understand sex ed. Pops made us a deal, even though we never actually bargained with him for it to begin with. As long as we were at Station 1 when a call went off, we would get to tag along - sit on the sidelines as spectators. No problem, considering the firehouse was basically our after-school activity.  
  
Pops would weed out the good from the bad, of course. So we didn't get to see _all_ the calls. No mangled wrecks with trauma or death. No structure fires with occupants trapped. So ... fire alarms, fender benders, kitchen or vacant building fires ... But to young kids watching these big, powerful people heave water-laden house and crumpled steel, it was _awesome_.  
  
It was also _really stupid_ for my dad to want to bring us. Unknown circumstances would reveal their existence all the time. A house involved in a rolling inferno might light a too-close propane tank. Drivers failed to notice the huge engine barricade around an accident and careen into them at full force. We got whiplash because of something like that. And oh how Jenny's grandma and _my_ mom **_both_** gave Pops an _earful_!  
  
Didn't stop him from inviting us, though.  
  
Sure as hell didn't keep us from coming.  
  
_Official_ Junior firefighters could get a little more involved. Assist in the carrying of tools. Pull hose. Mostly it was 'training' - in-house regimens that would eventually groom us into becoming full fledged department members. Exercise. Mock tests. Crawling through the worm tube.  
  
_The worm tube_. What a bastard. It was this concrete cylinder some fifty feet long. You had to creep through it in full gear, SCBA et all. The further you inched, the tighter it got.  
  
_No big deal!_ I thought, watching Jenny pull herself from the opposite end in exuberant triumph. Shit, I was the daughter of a firefighter. _I got this!  
  
Fuck_ no.  
  
Sweat trickled when I was forced to remove the air pack from my spine and push it in front of me. Then once my shoulders were cinched up against the rest of me and no amount of straining would grant me that _sweet release_ of movement, it was all over.  
  
Lungs seized. Chest tightened. Panic was a toxic cloud consuming the precious breathable air in my mask. The steel toes of my boots scrabbled on unforgiving mortar. I was grunting and wheezing _and all about screaming_ , sucking wind from the air pack and _holy crap I'm stuck I'm stuck I'm gonna die here -_  
  
Jenny reached the tube first. She was outside the walls, above me ... and I could vaguely make out the dull _thud thud!_ of her little fists pounding, barely breaking the surface above the thundering heartbeat in my ears. "You got this, Nora!"  
  
Her screech was joined by my father's commanding baritone, his reverberations making more of an audible impact on my hearing. "Calm down, baby! Deep breaths!"  
  
Then the whole tunnel was vibrating. A cacophony of thunder brought on by the half-a-dozen Juniors that came on with us. Pulsations scuttled along the surface, penetrated my bones, shook my chest cavity until rust rattled from my diaphragm I was able to actually _breath_ again.

And I dredged on. Tired. Fearful. But now _confident_ that I was safe. Surrounded by friends. Loved ones that would fight or die to bring me home alive. Darkness ebbed into dawning light, then freedom ... and even though I ripped the mask off in a desperate attempt to _feel_ the actual breeze of creeping Autumn, the notion that I'd done it, that I made it, was ... exhilarating.  
  
We were all together. We were all going to be _fine_. Safety in numbers. Back-to-back against the odds. Jenny pulled me into a tight sisterly embrace and I was laughing. Pops clapped me hard on the back with a holler, and I was _glowing_.  
  
Nothing would confine me.  
  
Mom would be so _proud_ when we told her.  
  
And then I remembered we buried her last Spring.  
  
\--  
  
_There were a million other ways she could be sleeping, but this was the best. Her absolute favorite.  
  
Tucked into the metal man's chest, feeling the furnace blasting from his chest that only erupted for her, only her. Steel arms draped in synthetic flesh encircled her waist. He held her tight and close, with her head held firm and soft under his stoic chin.  
  
Hot oil and coolant and the faint musk of old-war cologne - it was **his** scent. Familiar. Comforting. Safe.  
  
She breathed him in. "Hey, Valentine."  
  
Furry flesh. Thumping off to her right. Panting. Nora's head jostled in place, the sudden rumbling conquering Nick's body forcing her own to respond with a misty confusion made worse when the detective creaked open his tattered lips to **bark**..  
  
Bark.  
  
What?  
  
_ Disappointment was an unkind maiden to wake to.  
  
The rattling mass at her back was not Nick Valentine, it was Dogmeat. She'd fallen asleep again. _Goddamnit._ And he was bellowing. _Double damnit._ Bleary, lead-encrusted eyes would not open on demand. What was the pooch getting at? Did he see something? Dogmeat hadn't moved from under her head (he had so willingly transfigured into a pillow during the long, chilly night), but the tension in his slim bodice was palpable. No growling. No snarling or pouncing to his paws to charge the threat. Just loud, obnoxious threats sounding off from his long snout. _"This is my master! Stay away!"  
  
_ When the glue bonding her eyes shut refused to yield, Nora catered to an easy solution. Hot adrenaline forced its way under the epidermis, slinging itself into awaiting veins. Constricting vessels, expanding bronchioles. She gasped for air, lurched forward. Wide awake. Aware. Orbs snapping open with red tendrils fingering across white sclera.  
  
Bones that ached screamed when she stood. Her right leg, normally only an issue during the horrendous RadStorms or legitimate rain, howled agony - acid clawing up and down the length of her calf, burrowing beneath the kneecap. Muscles heaved, sore and burning from lack of rest. But they moved. Unwilling. On her feet _it hurt so bad_ but she was up and at 'em and ready to rock.  
  
Nora counted. One, _two_ , **_three_**. A wave of numbness rolling in like a fog off the morning sea.  
  
The spent Psycho syringe clattered into a pile of its brethren, used and abandoned. She drew the sleeve of her shirt over the nook of her elbow, allowing herself to scratch where pinprick holes hissed agitation.  
  
What storm she had seen lurking in the distance last night had crept its way north. No rain during the night. Awesome. Not like she had a roof over her head or anything. Definitely not. The East Boston Police Station lacked that ... along with general structural integrity. Polished floors and pristine walls gave way to the passage of time and god knows how may assaults. The roof collapsed onto the second floor, which collapsed onto the first ... and the first was currently gurgling a watery grave, sunken and partially flooded.  
  
Small miracle she wasn't knee-deep in Mirelurks right now.  
  
Nora wobbled once, grappled her worse-for-wear pickaxe and glared on ahead. The German Shepherd bounded to the precinct's withered edge, continuing his tirade. Whatever Dogmeat had been so adamant about terrifying was either long gone or hiding, because there sure as shit wasn't anything there worth noting. She had taken care to clear the place first before stopping in for the night.  
  
Maybe a little recklessly, considering the gauze slapped over her right bicep that glistening with not-so-old blood.  
  
"Whatcha got, buddeeeh?" she crowed bedraggledly, accompanying her equally worse-for-wear body to where Dogmeat loomed. "Got a baddie?"  
  
Pinprick pupils trailed on. Scanned the horizon. Not a thing. One Mirelurk off to the far west, vanishing beneath the tide. Some feral ghouls, listless and dead on the roughened topsoil. East was a blank canvass. Nothing but -  
  
\- a flash of deep scarlet. Small in comparison to the buildings. Human-sized. Maybe. Hard to tell from that distance. Vanishing beyond where she could see.  
  
Huh.  
  
Nora wanted to sit but the Psycho slapped that bitch and told her to get a move on. She kicked the heap of syringes with a bout of frustration, hissing regretfully when it knocked the pile of bones leaning against the ratty desk in the corner. Poor corpse didn't stand a chance. Maybe he wouldn't mind. The sod's soul probably died 200 years ago, given his police uniform.  
  
Still. "Sorry," she uttered lowly. Nora closed her eyes - _the flash of a trench coat, yellow oculars glowering_ \- and stuffed the Eddie Winter holotape, still clenched tightly in her left hand from last night, into the depths of her jacket.  
  
_No._  
  
Scratch that. She instead sat the tape in her satchel.

Nora shrugged off the Silver Shroud coat. Acquires some five months ago, it was an item of pride. Of glory. Of justice. Kent Connolly had beamed with such _glee_ when the entourage of Dick and Dick-in-training returned from the Hubris Comics, all gusto and good times. Nick Valentine hefting the Grognak axe was about the funniest shit she'd ever seen. (And the bashful laugh he tittered when declining her plea for him to don the matching loincloth was something adorable to behold).

How Kent's small hands had _shaken_ when Nora gave him the episodic holotapes. _How Leroy spoke so highly of his kid brother - innocent, simple, but the sweetest thing next to cherry pie_.  
  
"Sorry kid," she whispered, instead draping the wonderfully warm and magically fitting duster over the crumpled remnants of Pre-War America's lost, long-dead police officer. "I don't ... "  
  
Tracheal tightness contained the flow of words. With a quick hit of Jet to calm the overwhelming quivering of her digits, Nora sauntered down the broken slabs of wall as a spider would. Dogmeat effortlessly followed suit.  
  
_Sorry, kid. I don't deserve to be your Shroud._  
  
____

"John."  
  
"Nick."  
  
The detective was never a fan of Goodneighbor. A lot of bad rabble and illicit activities, things that made Pre-War Nick's skin crawl. If it hadn't been for the Memory Den, he may well have avoided entering the domain altogether. But the settlement, as rampant as it might be at some points with crime, was not without its good eggs. From Kent to Irma, Amari to Daisy, And Hancock. Even Hancock.  
  
Nick pulled on his cigarette with a sigh, surveying the room. The Ghoul king of Goodneighbor was slouched on his sofa, one arm draped around the back end and the other diddling with an unlit cigar. Eyes like sunken black pits mirrored bored resignation. "So, what brings you to town? Your fusion core finally go bad or somethin'?"  
  
"Har."  
  
They weren't exactly friends. Not truly. Nick wasn't keen on the brutal mannerisms with which Hancock handled his problems, and the Ghoul didn't exactly have a lot of respect for the due process of law. But without Hancock, Goodneighbor would be a helluva lot worse. The sleuth knew a good leader when he saw one. Perhaps he didn't quite rule with an iron fist, but the locals had a huge amount of respect for their mayor. He kept the walls safe and the rifraff in check, and if things ever went too far it wasn't beyond him to settle the issue personally.  
  
"Pop a squat." Hancock patted the cushion beside him, beckoning the Synth to rest his tired rear. Nick needed no rest - in fact he wanted to get his answers and blast out the door in pursuit - but he was by no means rude. His alloy skeleton sank him deep into the furniture, and he groaned when the mayor jibed about his weight. "Whatcha here for, old man?"

Hancock _at least_ had decent manners. He liked Nick enough not to give him the boot. A beloved reputation followed the Synth everywhere he went, and it was hard not to recognize Nick's unwavering responsibility towards the Commonwealth and its people. To that end, the Ghoul acknowledged him. Goodneighbor's citizens eventually warmed to the idea of inviting a Synth into their humble abode once overcoming their general fear that an Institute spy was among them.  
  
"I'm lookin' for Nora," Nick told him bluntly. "Got a number of folks tellin' me she was headin' this way. Have you seen her?"  
  
Slicing a knife across the cigar's tip, Hancock leaned forward. The detective produced a lighter on the fly. Amber light blossomed across their faces: ruined visages alight with flame. "You finally scare yer dame off, Nicky?"

He didn't quite blanch at the term ' _dame_ ', but the coolant pump buried in his chest cavity whirred in response. "It'd take more than this old mug to chase her off."  
  
"Well somethin' certainly got to her," Hancock shrugged, resting his back against the sofa's arm and exhaling plumes. "Came here huntin' dragons, left stalkin' ghosts."  
  
Nick blinked. "Hunting .... dragons?"  
  
"Slip on the fun sticks?" Hancock earned nothing but a blank stare. "Follow the yellow brick road? Wrestle a Yao Guai?"  
  
"John, what in the _hell_ are you trying to say?"  
  
"Jesus Christ you are **_old_** /" The Ghoul pulled an ash tray to him. "She came here to get _high_ , mate."  
  
If he'd had a larynx, it would have been spasming violently with his sharp intake of unnecessary air. "She _WHAT_?"  
  
"Yup." Gnarled fingers unfolded to point at one of the many recliners he'd planted in the Old State House. This room was under constant renovation, it seemed. A bit of furniture that took up place earlier in the week would be pushed out of sight, out of mind, and replaced with something different - nicer or more ungainly, it really depended on Hancock's state of mind ... or his guests. And with a squint of his eyes, Valentine could make out the tiniest traces of dog hair. "Chilled here for ... what, two days? Three? Hard to keep track of time." Snorting into his hand, Hancock's ghastly maw twisted upwards. "We blew through a shit ton of the stash."  
  
Nick's jaw tightened, iron teeth grinding with the intent to cause sparks. Enamel paint be damned. "You let her _use chems_?"  
  
"Why not? The chick looked like she'd gotten bowled over by half a dozen Deathclaws. She deserved something to take the edge off." At the scouring glare offered to him by one flippantly furious detective, Hancock did little more than grin. "Look, I ain't gonna deny somebody's good times. It calmed her down. For a while. Then it'd wear off and she'd start getting frantic. Bit o' Jet to ease the nerves. Psycho to stay awake."  
  
"She never slept?"  
  
"Couldn't. Tried the first day. Kept wakin' up screamin'."  
  
Robotic left leg starting to bounce in anxiety - which was _off_ , because there were no adrenal glands to prompt such a response - Nick forgot the cancer stick in his mouth. Paper had been burnt down until the filtered butt started to catch fire. Hancock had to forcibly remove it. "Earth to Nicky?"  
  
"When did she leave?" Unfettered. Not even an apology for _nearly burning a hole in his lovely, oh-so soft red sofa_. The Ghoul huffed indignation. "Any idea of where she might've gone?"  
  
"Last week? I think? I ain't the best of keepin' track of time, Nick-o." Long nails scratched at the mottled skin of his neck. "And I dunno. Said somethin' about her kid not really being her kid. She looked all sorts of wreck the day before she split. The fuck's goin' on with her, copper? Ain't you two been practically tied at the hip?"

Really no idea what to say to that. Nick 'cleared his throat'. "She infiltrated the Institute."  
  
Well that certainly caught his attention. Hancock all but leapt out of his seat. "What?!"  
  
"Month and a half ago. Went AWOL for a bit. Came back two weeks ago. She ran the moment she touched soil." The stiffness of her embrace bounced in his brain. Her breath of fire had been vanquished. Tarnished by something vile. Uprooted. Lost. _He wished he could feel something other than worry and nagging guilt._ If he'd been flesh and bone, maybe queasiness would rock his center. "She wasn't ... _there_." Hancock tapped at his own noggin' in query to Nick's statement and the Synth nodded. "Something she saw at the Institute had her rattled."  
  
_Shoulda chased her the second she ran._ Instead Nick convinced himself to wait it out, give her room to breath. She would be back. _GIve it a week,_ he kept thinking. Two days later he was so worked up with worry that he packed his bags and stole off in the middle of the night.  
  
"Her kid wasn't her kid. That's what she kept repeating," Hancock told hm again.  
  
With his cigarette long snubbed out, Nick stood with a wide sweep of his trench coat. No point in lingering. Hancock didn't know where she went off to. With every one of her cells lit up with chems like the 4th of July, there was really no telling where she might have gone. Or where she might go. Was she addicted now? Forever trying to sate the hunger of what the drugs would give her but nothing else would? The idea of his detective-in-training, the Doll with Attitude, a frail ghost ... a shadow of herself ... stooping to low places to find relief ... It terrified him.

She was somewhat reckless from the start. No telling how far she might go now.

And there was a definite, reasonable fear that she might deliberately take a _hair_ too much ...  
  
"If yer not sure where she coulda gone, I'm gonna go ahead and leave," Nick said, starting for the door. "Keep an ear out for an old cop, will ya?"  
  
But the chemtrail of vapor and hot ash was sidestepping him, striding past him with vigilance and determination. Snub-nosed shotgun resting upon his shoulder and a gaze that might kill, Hancock was all business. "Yeah. No prob. At your side, though."  
  
"You gotta town to run, don't you?"  
  
"They can do without little old me for a little bit. 'Sides, Fahrenheit can hold it down." Chompers of nicotine yellow flashed, barely parting to speak. "Let's go find the kitten, huh? She's gotta pay me back anyhow."  
  
"Pay you back ... ?"  
  
"Swindled me outta some happy juice when she left. I was konked out when she slipped out." Nick went rigid. Hancock sighed. "I get it. She's in a bad, baaaaaaaaad place. But she might ... " A wrinkled arm swung in the air, attempting to bat the thought process out of his sight. "She might go too far. I don't wanna have that on my conscious. I mean, she's a nice girl. Refreshin' sight for tired eyes."  
  
A few days of 'buddy buddy bonding', and the easygoing mayor of Goodneighbor was as anxious for the Vaultdweller's wellbeing as most of the folks who'd met her. Those two never really caught on. Nora was too submerged in her own business to really bother getting to know him - fom stalking into the Glowing Sea to aiding Kent in reviving legends of the Silver Shroud. But whatever they said in those three days, whatever Hancock has heard ... it resonated with him. Struck home. Found gold.  
  
Metal scaffolding padded for the pack of smokes in his breast pocket. Nick eyes the Ghoul gratefully. "Let's head, then."  
  
____  
  
**Nodus Tollens** : The realization that the plot of your life doesn't make sense to you anymore.  
  
_"If the Synths are intelligent and self-aware, then they have a right to free will."  
  
"However closely they may approximate human behavior, they are still our creations." Nora didn't like the pause in his voice. Didn't like his stoic disposition. This conversation had been had before, with somebody else. Many times. Probably. His answer was so automated. Computer-like. "When you see what I have to show you, I think you will agree that we know what is best for our Synths."  
  
_ Nick Valentine, tossed aside like wasted garbage. Nick Valentine, waiting faithfully for her opposite of the C.I.T. in the midst of a RadStorm. Nick Valentine, launching into a crushing hug when she returned to the Castle. Little touches. Little gestures.  
  
_Two Arts bickering on the road. The real one pulling a gun. Blasting a plethora of cybernetic material out of the head of the other.  
  
"A rogue Synth has taken over the raider gang at Libertalia. His memories have been erased and his identity altered. He believes he's a man named Gabriel." Nora had swallowed. Hard. "Under his leadership, the raiders have taken many innocent lives."  
  
_ In truth, the reason seemed noble enough. Unfair. A little. The Synth had no idea who he was. But to save lives ...  
  
Nora had to divert her progression to Nahant Wharf when a Brotherhood of Steel vertibird blew overhead. Rapid gunfire so her backside, west over the hill she'd descended from. She had seen the Super Mutant encampment there. So too had the Power Armor military. Missiles erupted into the atmosphere. It seemed like a better, wiser option to make her and Dogmeat as low profile as possible. And that meant taking to the sea.  
  
The satchel was taking on water. Nora relished proudly in her foresight to wrap the essential in plastic baggies she'd scavenged from abandoned homes. Medical supplies would go untarnished. The goodie bag of chems untainted. Eddie Winter holotapes - all three of them - undamaged.  
  
She was still shaking off the bitter, radioactive tang of salt in her mouth when she crept up the craggy sand shore. Dogmeat paused to spin cycle his fur. He happy-go-luckily tagged after his master with a tongue lolling out. (What Nora wouldn't give to be in her dog's shoes - er, paws.)  
  
All in all, the water had been a good choice. It eased the pain in her leg. Shook the headache from her screeching cranium. Blew away the haze encapsulating gray matter. Then she starting thinking again. About Shaun. About the Institute. _About being left to freeze in the cryogenic Vault after a cavernous void had been left above Nate's left eye. All in the name of an experiment. All because he wanted to know what **she might do** if she were left alive. 60 years later. When Shaun was an older, brilliant man with graying hair and wrinkled flesh.  
  
No warm smile to greet her. No tears. No anguish. The babbling baby she'd birthed was gone. The lights in his eyes had turned technical. On point. Matter-of-factly. Indifference.  
  
At least Nate had been right. He'd grown to have his mother's chin.  
  
_ Legs like concrete. Vaguely aware of the sensation of sinking. Psychologically. Because her body hadn't moved up or down one inch or another. Breathing hitched. Chest knotted. White noise in her mind blotting out the low, petulant wail of her subconscious realizing the futility in everything she was doing anymore.  
  
Down one more Psycho. She tossed the syringe aside ( _didn't she hate polluting?_ ) and allowed endorphins to take over. Her arm was black and blue now. Hurting. She'd have to switch to the other one on her next go.

X6-88 was an intimidating Courser, but then they all had been. Nora hadn't been fond of them since her first encounter with one: Freeing the unknown Synth from his clutches; Nick balking at the nature of such an entity while she removed the essential courser chip from his manufactured brain (and it was soft and pink and _real_ and there was _blood_ and _bone_ and was this really, really a Synth?)  
  
He was surrounded by raider corpses. There was no way of telling what emotion he expressed. His facial features were unmoving and his eyes were concealed by sunglasses. But there was an air of disapproval. Maybe at her ragtag appearance. Or her soaking wet attire. Or the bags under her eyes and the gauntness to her flesh. Despite the shades Nora could feel his gaze boring into her. Whatever it was set a match to her flames. She felt the need to snap at him but bit it back when reminding herself what Coursers were capable of.  
  
"You must be the Courser I'm supposed to meet." They stood at length, neither daring to tread closer than the other. The distrust was mutual, then.  
  
"Yes ma'am. Designation X6-88." Her insides twisted. "I've already neutralized the perimeter guard, and we can start the assault on the main flotilla. Just give the word." The way he spoke. The way he moved. So inhuman. So alike the Generation 1's. She tried to imagine Nick speaking like that and felt an uncoiling horror pull the Psycho deep into herself.  
  
Nora gnashed her teeth between concealing lips. "All right. Let's go."  
  
"Right behind you."  
  
_____  
  
  
When we were 18, we became officially adopted as Boston Firemen. Well, Firewomen. I was first. Jenny hesitated, because her grandma fell ill with congestive heart failure and was a hospital frequent flyer.  
  
"You take care of what you gotta, Jen," I told her, gripping her shoulder tight. "How is she?"  
  
"Getting worse." The brunette's eyes were wet and puffy. Sniffling came every few seconds. "They put her on a ventilator this morning. Don't think she's gonna make it through the night."  
  
"She was talking plain as day last night." I was still dressed in my uniform when I'd met her outside her apartment. It was officially in Jenny's name now. Her grandmother must have sensed the end was near. The lease was only transferred two months ago, despite her granddaughter's protests.  
  
"She crashed at midnight. They brought her back but ... she wasn't all _there_ , you know?"  
  
My chest ached. Mrs. McKelvey - Jenny's family name, she never _did_ take it back - was one of the sweetest old women on the block. Milk and cookies every Friday. Dinner every Sunday after church. She fretted over every little thing Jenny did, ironed her clothes when she was at work, packed lunches ... Did everything she could to make up for Mrs. Lands' errant behavior in the past.  
  
It had done more than heal the broken dreams and shattered promises of Jenny's past. What couldn't be saved with family endearment was pieced together by the friendship and camaraderie that was her relationship with me, with the firehouse, with my family.  
  
"C'mon, girl. Let's go see your G-ma."  
  
The following Thursday, a wonderfully beautiful funeral was held for the late Mrs. McKelvey. Flowers of all shades, their aromas dancing with the warm summer wind. A homely little plot was picked out at Forest Hills Cemetery. She would rest beneath a tangled pair of wild oaks overlooking the pond.  
  
Funeral expenses were nothing to tangle with, but Jenny had been spared of that. Boston Fire Department, namely my father and Donald Mason (still assistant chief) and a handful of others recognized the good deed Mrs. McKelvey had done for one of their own and kindly picked up the tab, so that Jenny wouldn't be haunted by a single bill or reminder for the rest of her life.  
  
She took two months to mourn her loss. I was with her every step of the way.  
  
And when she finally stepped into Station 1 to claim her rightful position, it was with a rejuvenated appreciation for life.  
  
It didn't take long for them to assign her to her duties. Jenny was always the braniac. She was best suited for running on the engines: tactics, maintaining water supply, striking the core of the fire before it could build to an unbearable strength. She took to it like a pro and assumed command on more than one occasion.  
  
Myself? I was all about brawn and brass tacks. Pops personally claimed me to work the ladder with him. In and out of a burning building at the speed of light. RIT Team. Search and Rescue. Ventilation. Hitting heavy stuff with heavy stuff.  
  
While I knew he'd selected me to run with him because of my admirable skill as a brute, the heart of me knew he'd convinced himself that the only way I would stay safe and _alive_ was if I was with him. Mom's death still hit home with him. They were childhood sweethearts grown into soul mates. Her vacancy from our home was unsettling. Depressing. Gut-wrenching. I couldn't tell you how many times I woke up in the middle of the night, realized she wasn't there, and woke Pops up asking where she'd gone. How many times I came home with bags of candy I knew she loved, thinking Mom would jubilantly wrap me in her arms. Wonder why I no longer smelled coffee brewing in the morning.  
  
I tried to take her place. Hard. Woke up early to make breakfast and brew coffee. Grabbed the paper. Greeted Pops with a smile. He knew what I was attempting the instant he saw me hovering over the stove the first day. For the first two weeks, we couldn't sit down to eat toast and bacon without weeping. After the hurt wore off, it had settled into something routine.  
  
It helped me heal. Helped _him_ heal. But he was afraid. Because I was all he had left.  
  
The day was October 1, 2063. Vault-Tec was finishing construction of most of their underground bunkers. Grognak  & the Ruby Ruins was just released. And at 5:47PM I slid down the firepole to the blazing alarm of a structure fire in Jamaica Plain.  
  
Donald Mason charged past me, shouting a, "Lets go, Peanut!"  
  
And Pops, with a proud smile and tired eyes, stared on at me from the back of Ladder 21. "Let's go, kiddo."  
  
The first day of the rest of my life.  
  
The worst day.  
  
One of the many.  
  
_______  
  
_"So tell me, is the Institute so desperate for resources that its stealing plunder from honest, hard-working Commonwealth gangs?"  
  
"B5-92, initiate factory reset." This was insane. This was insane. "Authorization gamma-7-1-epsilon."  
  
_ 'Gabriel', as he'd come to calling himself, grew limp at the words. _Stasis_. The raiders that were his family circled like vultures. Calling for him. Frantic. Terrified. Their horror turned to anger. Anger turned to a murderous bloodlust. Bullets soared through the air. Knives came dangerously close to cutting her throat. Blood was spilled. Shells clattered. But in the end it was the Courser, the Sole Survivor, and the Dog than stood their ground.  
  
When X6-88 crossed the distance between himself and 'Gabriel', he placed an arm on the lifeless Synth's shoulder. There was the briefest cross of gazes. His concealed eyes met Nora's. And the burning sensation of judgment felt like it as no longer there. Or at least it had toned into something more manageable.  
  
"This is X6-88," he uttered in the eerie, calm monotone to nobody in particular. "Ready to relay with reclaimed Synth, B5-92."  
  
Nora stepped back. She knew enough from Kellogg's memories what was to come.  
  
Lightning arced from the sky, a bolt from nowhere. White hot light. Blinding. It hurts her eyes, imploded her ear drums. When the rumbling died and the pallor glow faded into neutral sunlight, Nora was alone.  
  
A little bit of Jet to halt her shivering.  
  
She brought the Pip-Boy up to where she could turn the dials. Time to follow the Courser's lead and head back 'home' -  
  
- _the wonderful sea breeze, endless jostling activity of rebuilding castle walls, Dogmeat barking at a Radcrane, shoulder-to-shoulder with Nick Valentine and Robert Joseph MacCready and Preston Garvey -  
  
_ A sharp pain in her side. Dumbed down and barely there, diluted into something like an annoying cramp courtesy of the Psycho that still pumped adrenaline throughout her circulatory system. Nora's initial conclusion was that it was just her nerves. Sparking off. Synapses misfiring. A pulled muscle. Or depression making another ache noticeable.  
  
Until she felt the warmth spreading from it. Smelled the iron. Heard Dogmeat _growl_.  
  
Nora felt the bothersome tidbit with the bare tips of her gloves fingers. It was wet. Hot. Touched closer to the center of contact - felt hardness, metal. Attached to a hilt. Held by grubby fingers  
  
They _twisted_. She grunted, shoving the assailant off with gusto. "Get off," she hissed, flailing her pickaxe backwards. "Get away!" Pain didn't exist. Rage did. She saw red, felt heat from her chest, heard her heart in her ears.  
  
Where had the raider come from? They cleared the area! Took every painstaking moment to check every room, every nook, every cranny! _The fuzz of your brain, Nora. Missed a room. Maybe. Didn't see movement. Did you see movement?_  
  
She couldn't make out the details of his face beyond the gas mask, but he dipped at her reckless swinging and charged in for a more central hit with his blade. Dogmeat was on him, fierce teeth and vice jaw clamping onto the offending arm, dragging him to the ground.  
  
Not enough.  
  
More were coming.  
  
They crept from the cattycorners like cockroaches. First two, then five. And they didn't come with blades. Not all of them. They bore artillery. Pipe pistols and shotguns. All firing. All striking home. A blast of crimson from her right leg, splintering bone. A sickening crunch under her left arm. Hot metal. Viscous ichor.  
  
Psycho was strong. Her body's agony made itself known only through tiny pinpricks and buzzings. Nora pushed against it, reaching for her plasma pistol. She'd become a better shot since MacCready joined their ranks. He was teaching her to be a sniper, one step at a time. A stumble forward, ripping the pistol from her side and pulling back the hammer.  
  
A bullet tore through her wrist. Cartilage burst. Fingers could no longer grip the handle. The weapon fell with a heavy clatter.  
  
"Dogmeat - "  
  
The first raider hollered for help and his brethren were quick to join his side. A German Shepherd was a massive guard dog. Intimidating to the normal human. Outgunned and overpowered by a mob. A great red blistering welt appeared on his hind leg, followed closely by another one that struck almost the same mark. Dogmeat backpedaled with a yelp, releasing the tenuous grip on his prey.  
  
"Dogmeat!"  
  
Nora lunged with intent to kill, but a heavy weight cascaded against her backside and sent her flying face-first into rough wood. A virtual Deathclaw on her back. Whoever that was, they needed to lay off the Fancy Lads. Dirty fingers appeared to her sides, held down her arms, her legs ... and she writhed, hollered, _screamed_ when the first raider kicked and kicked and **_kicked_** Dogmeat until the hound rolled off the platform, careening headlong into the ruthless waters that awaited below with pained yelps that vanished beneath the ocean current.  
  
Lungs seized. Chest tightened. Panic was a toxic cloud consuming the precious breathable air. Nonexistent walls were boxing in. Containing her. _Choking_ her -  
  
\- _fire and ash. Tumbling wood. Collapsing floors. Air was running out. Pops was close. She could hear his PASS device. Where was he? So tight. So dark. Can't see, can't move_ -  
  
Gas Mask Raider sauntered to Nora. He favored his arm, cradling it with his other one. Streamlets of blood raced over mangled globules of flesh.  
  
He got to one knee, head cocking to one side. Nora could finally peer into the plexiglas of his mask to note the blues of his eyes. He made this easier by removing the offending piece of plastic, and when he spoke she was hit with the full brunt of his rotting breath, made ever worse by blackened teeth and bleeding gums.  
  
"I dunno what the fuck ya did with Gabriel, _bitch_ ," he snarled, low and hard. "But yer gonna have a lotta time to think _long and hard_ 'bout what you've done."

She wanted to spit blood in his eyes. To curse. To lift these _bodies_ off of her and bring the man down, rip his throat out, gouge out the eyes, laugh at his misery -  
  
\- hard, blistering pain at the back of her skull - _yellow mechanical eyes, a tattered trench coat, vanishing into the sunset, leaving her behind_ -  
  
\- darkness.  
  
______  
  
_"Mayday mayday mayday!"  
  
_  
  


 


	4. Libertalia

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Trigger warning: Rape
> 
> Reminder: First-person present/past-tense is Nora's memories. Third-person past-tense is what's going on now.

_  
"Mayday mayday mayday!"  
  
"Unit calling mayday, go ahead."  
  
_ When we were 13, our classmate Jason Mackentyre cornered Jenny in the soccer field after a game and loudly belittled her for failing to score the last goal. I came running to her aid like always. Pushing him away, I told him he'd best screw off before I called the coach over.

There were many ways to describe Jason. Kind and mild-mannered were not some of them.

_"I don't know where I am! The roof gave out - I can't find Pops - !"  
  
Jenny's voice crackles through the portable. "Nora, how's your air?"  
  
"Half a tank!" I try to move. Pain shoots up the length of my right side and I'm wheezing. "Shit - !"_

I wrapped an arm around Jenny's shoulder and lead her to the rest of our team. Jason was heckling me nonstop. He was trying so hard to provoke me into a fight by continuously hurling insults at Jenny. But by this time in our lives, my friend was used to the bullshit. She'd learn to hit the mute button. Learned not to cry at every little thing because, really, it just wasn't worth it.  
  
_"Are you injured?"  
  
"I think my leg is broken!" Breathing hurts. Panic starts to set in, because it's hot and dark and the smoke is starting to layer at ceiling level (is that the ceiling, or is it part of the roof that came down with us?).  
  
"Stay calm and find the wall! RIT team is assembling!"  
  
But then I hear the **chirp chirp chirp** that graduates into an ear-piercing screech. A PASS device is going off. And it isn't off my air pack, which means.  
  
"I hear Pops! Gonna try to find him!"  
  
_ Jason was upset. His attempts to garner a response, earning no attention from either of us, started dismantling into nonsensical babble. He's red in the face. Heated.  
  
And then the damning words tumbled out. "Good thing your mom's _dead_! Bitch would hate how much of a pussy you are!"

Up until that point, I had been holding it together so well.  
  
_I slide onto my belly. The minute I try to move my arms in front of me, tears spring to my arms. It's not just my leg. My shoulder screams defiance. "Damnit!"  
  
The PASS keeps going off. Pops isn't able to turn it off. Pinned? Unconscious? (I refuse to think dead, I refuse to think dead). Somewhere ahead of me to the right. To hell with the hurt. I rely on adrenaline alone.  
  
_ I don't remember turning, don't remember _running_. Just a haze of red and rage and then an array of arms were pulling me back and somebody was shouting to call an ambulance. Iron hung heavy in the air. Crimson dripped from my knuckles.

Then there were flashing blues and I was lead off. Sitting in the back of a patrol car, heaving in ragged breaths. Stared at like I was some rabid animal.  
  
_I finally find Pops. Half of him. The other half is buried, hidden under part of a steel truss and several dozen pounds of wood and roofing shingles. I know I'm breathing quicker than I should be. I'll blow through my SCBA in no time flat. My hands find his shoulder. I shake. I call his name. And to my relief, he moans in response. At least it's something.  
  
Black smoke is getting lower. Four feet above us now. "Pops, I'm getting you out of here!"  
  
I know the unlikeliness of this fear the second I hear myself say it, but at that moment I believe I can move mountains.  
  
He groans. "Nora - "_

 _My gloved hands find the straps of his airpack and pull. To my surprise and triumph, he actually slides out just a hair. But that's all. His body snags on something and when I yank harder he whimpers.  
  
Blistering death is two feet from the top of my helmet. It's getting hotter. Wood snaps above me.  
  
Pops manages to push himself onto his elbows. He joins me, weakly, in trying to remove himself. I can't see what holding him in place. It's too dark. And then his air pack starts sputtering off. Rapid-fire clicks that indicate his cylinder is about spent. I pull harder. "Dad, c'mon!"  
  
And he looks up at me. I see his eyes through the mask. The terror that lays there. And something else that shines across their surface that raises bile to my esophagus. I can't tell what it is at that moment. It isn't until later that I piece it together: acceptance.  
  
"Baby ..."  
  
_ When I was 13, I beat Jason Mackentyre nearly to death. He was in a coma for three months before finally starting to come to. I felt my actions were justified until I learned that he had Disruptive Mood Dysregulation Disorder, and then the only sensation I knew what shame. I had almost killed a disabled child. I was almost convicted of murder.  
  
As understanding as Boston PD was, they also couldn't turn a blind eye to what I'd done. By right, I should have gone to juvie. Pops was able to pull some strings instead. He begged the court to let me perform community service by joining the Boston Fire Department's Junior Program when I was eligible at 14. The judge, aware that we were still in the process of grieving from the loss my mother - which had a huge role to play in my reaction to Jason's inciting words - swayed to agree.  
  
At that time I actually hadn't planned to become a firefighter. Shocker. The idea was there, but so were many other aspirations - a doctor, a member of RobCo, being the president of Mars (hah!). Getting rooted into the Junior program redirected my drive into become a full department member.  
  
_Cracking like loud thunder. Movement above. Debris falling. My father, tired and listless, drew up his remaining strength. He reached for me. In a foolish heartbeat, I thought - for whatever stupid reason - he was going in for a hug.  
  
Instead he shoved me backwards with a grunt. I reeled onto my ass, SCBA clanging against something hard.  
  
And then the building came down and I couldn't see him anymore.  
  
_ I often wondered what would have happened if I was able to control my temper that day. I wouldn't have beaten Jason to within an inch of his life. I wouldn't have to face community service, wouldn't eventually become a fireman.

I wouldn't have been on the Ladder with my father. We wouldn't have been on the rooftop of a meth house in Jamaica Plain.  
  
I could have changed the outcome of events.  
  
I could have saved him.  
  
_____  
  
Nick's first hunch was to head back to Sanctuary Hills. A nagging sensation in his circuitry warned him against hosting false hope, though. It was a Minutemen settlement these days. No doubt Preston Garvey had been transmitting radio messages to them over the past week or so. If Nora was there, they would have found her.  
  
But he kept dwelling on those memories of her: lurking in the dark corners of her own home; sitting on the mangled bed frame once shared with her husband, a distant stare preoccupying her normally thoughtful face; hovering over the baby blue crib that once contained her babbling child.

A part of him was certain she was ghosting the old town. That maybe just the right detective could scout her out.  
  
That very same detective felt his wiring kink with disappointment when proven wrong. The hike the Sanctuary took a day and a half. Wasted time that could have been spent going the other way. Nick pulled at the tubes running through his exposed jawline, grunting in frustration when Hancock elbowed him in the side and warned him to quit it.  
  
Nevertheless, the ever-diligent officer pressed on to the Sanctuary Hills citizens with questions. "Have you seen Nora?" "Anything at all?" "See Dogmeat floating around?" "Keep an ear out, alright?"  
  
"Where next?" Hancock huffed through Jet-imbued fumes. There was a gloss coating his 8-ball eyes, but the worry lines could not tuck away under his nigh-constant drug haze. "Goodneighbor's out. So's her hometown."  
  
"No point goin' back to the Castle," Nick grumbled. Fumbling with the cellophane off his crisp pack of Grey Tortoises - a rare commodity gifted to him by the very Vaultdweller they sought - the Synth set his orbs alight eastward. "Vault 81. Could be a long shot. Did a good thing there. They practically worship the ground she walks on."  
  
Not to mention they started looking to Nick himself as a peer. Their eyes upon him weren't quite the same when they focused on Nora. There was, of course, still the metal and rubber to get over before considering him 'human'. Yet they were friendly. Welcoming. All charming smiles and 'how do you do neighbor?' and -  
  
Realization slapped him like a super sledge to the chin.  
  
That night - several months ago now - when Kellogg paid him a quite uninvited visit, usurped control of his body, and attempted to strip Nora of her life. The Sole Survivor had only hung around Goodneighbor long enough to get a stiff drink. Afterwards, she had vanished into the night. Blowing off steam, probably. Nick never _did_ find out where she'd wandered off to.  
  
_Think._ Nora hadn't vanished right out the gate after returning from the Institute. She'd gone to Goodneighbor first to yuck it up with the Ghoul mayor and then ... _poof_. Just like before. But for much, much longer.  
  
Dawning understanding eeked it's way into Nick's frown. "No, she's not gonna hit any place ... populated." Nimble metallic fingers selected a single cigarette from the pack. He turned it over beneath scrutinous eyes to inspect it with a sense of admiration and _She's a real sweetheart to think of me when pillaging an abandoned Vault._ "Nora doesn't wanna be around anyone she knows. The less friendly folks, the better."  
  
" _Friendly_? Ya think she mighta gone off to start a brawl with some raiders?"  
  
"She ain't that brash."  
  
"She's also pumped full of chems, my friend."

Nick exhumed a long sigh. "True enough."

Was it truly possible that she might become _that_ reckless? He'd known her to jump into danger to protect somebody. Hell, she'd dragged his sorry hide through gunfire to safety and wound up nursing several bullet wounds herself (while being peppered by Valentine's equally reprimanding and grateful lectures). But the only time he had ever seen her charge headlong into danger without considering the consequences was with Kellogg, and even _then_ they had prepared with enough stims and ammunition to bring the Prydwen crashing to the ground and live to tell the tale.  
  
But now she had Psycho and God knows whatever else in her blood. And ... come to think of it, Nick hadn't a _clue_ of how she was going to handle that. Nora was adamant against the use of drugs. Even if she was gasping in pain, she would turn down a dose of Med-X and troop on. Tough as nails, that dame.  
  
Now with an additional flavor: 'death wish'. The idea of her being in danger was so enormously unsettling to Nick. He tried not to imagine her getting in a wringer with a raider gang. Or fending off a Deathclaw on her own. Or -- _blood on the asphalt; flashing reds and blues hindering his waning sanity; lifeless fingers, stretched - arms out, reaching - eyes open, unseeing. Jenny's name crept into his throat. It snapped out as a garbled whisper to his own muted ears but as a shriek to his colleagues that tried - and failed - to hold him back -_  
  
Steel teeth snapped against the Grey Tortoise's filter, cleaving it in half. Hancock remorsefully watched the unsmoked tobacco stick bounce off ruined road. "What a waste."  
  
Nick didn't blink. Instead his eyes 'glitched' off and on again. _Get ahold of yourself, Nick. That ain't your memory. That ain't your mind._ "Our best bet's to go back to the Castle," he stated, clearing his 'throat'. "Search the perimeter within a few miles and spread out with each pass. I didn't take into consideration that she might stick near just to be close to the teleporter."  
  
Hancock shifted the sawed-off from one shoulder to the other. "So, more hiking."  
  
A whirring came within hearing range behind them. It crept closer, growing louder and louder with each ticking second. "More hiking," Nick confirmed, and turned to face the music.  
  
Two floating robots approached them: Codsworth and a more pristine-looking Curie. Even if he lacked a face to relay the state of his wellbeing, Nora's personal 'butler bot' had a voice module that was so _animated_ that Nick could almost visualize human features to go with it.  
  
"Mr. Valentine!" crowed the Mister Handy. "Sir, please allow me to accompany you! I am so terribly worried about my mistress' health. I simply _cannot_ rest my head without knowing she is safe!"  
  
__

_Rolling my wheelchair onto the hospital helipad ... Leg in a cast ... Arm in a sling ... Sharp, glistening needles sliding under ribs with each inhalation ... At least the burns hadn't been beyond help. First degree. They'd dragged me out before it got worse.  
  
Thing is, I couldn't remember getting pulled from the building._

_My first waking memory was jolting upright on a hospital gurney, screaming for my father. And then screaming because **screaming** hurt. "Where's Pops?" "Ow, fuck!" "Dad?!"  
  
It didn't take Jenny long to find me. Before long we were leaning onto each other. Crying. Endlessly. Shirts and bandages soaked with tears. Pops was dead. They'd pulled him from the house. Air pack ran dry. He suffocated before he was roasted alive by the all-consuming flashover. Pops was dead. Pops was **dead**.  
  
_ When ransacking Police Precinct 8 in central Boston for an elusive Eddie Winter holotape, they were swarmed by feral ghouls. One grabbed at her long hair and pulled her to the ground. They were on her in no less than a second, until a vengeful Nick Valentine charged in and alleviated the situation.  
  
Combing her over with concern and (she thought) fear, the detective had blurted, "Pretty as yer hair might be, think it's time ya considered givin' it a snip?"

Nora soothed her stress by jesting with him over being termed 'pretty'. Getting Valentine to laugh bashfully or spar teases with her was always rewarding. But she'd taken his advice to heart. It just never happened. No time, no time. Something always seemed to pop up. Another settlement that needed their help. Another clue to sniff out. Scouting out a cure for a plague in a new Vault. Stirring shit up in the Combat Zone just to inadvertently acquire a 'contract' that was, in fact, a woman of Irish descent named Cait. That haircut simply never came.  
  
As the Libertalia Gas Mask raider dragged her along the splintered wooden pier with his greasy hands yanking hard on her long, silvery locks, Nora wished she never set the idea of a cut to the back of her busy mind.  
  
Psycho still coursed heavily through her veins. She fought adamantly, writhing under their grip. Bald patches appeared across her scalp where she'd wrenched away from Gask Mask's iron fist. Fingers found and encircled various things to be used as weapons - a bottle; a wooden plank; a randomly placed toy car. But always the would converge upon her, boots embedding into her sides or her arms or her legs, into pre-existing bullet wounds ... Always Gask Mask would find another grip on her head. And holding a weapon was useless: the cartilage in her wrist having been destroyed along with any notion of fighting back. Her brain, it seemed, had enough common sense to leave her left hand out of this. No sense in losing the use in both limbs. It flopped listlessly at her side.  
  
For every second that her body stopped its rebellion, another two seconds would be added onto her continued resistance throughout the 'dragging'. In one such moment she locked eyes with a female raider at her left, and spit in her face with such reward-winning trajectory that MacCready would have cheered.  
  
It was a mistake. "You bitch!" roared the woman, descending on her. A flurry of fists met her face until Nora tasted and smelled blood. _That's gonna leave a mark._ Breathing through her nose was suddenly a strained effort.  
  
But she wouldn't be outdone. "Fuck you," she hissed, hot coils unrolling from her chest. _Dogmeat, yelping as he was kicked into the sea._ "I'll rip you the fuck apart."  
  
And they were laughing. _Laughing_. At **_her_**. Mirthless. Cold. Panic creeped in through tiny cracks. _X6-88 will come back, won't he? Shaun will wonder where I am. He'll get worried. He'll send the Courser to find me._  
  
She didn't believe it even as she thought it.  
  
_Age 23. I visit Jenny late one night in March. We sat drinking wine on her sofa when I tell her that I was leaving Boston.  
  
"I can't stop seeing the ghosts, Jen," I state softly, trying not to look at her disembodied, broken stare. "Can't stop ... **hearing** them. I can't sleep. I can't ... " She **'hics'**. I feel liquid warmth bud at the corner of my eyes. "I talked to Aunt Haley. I'm going to Brooklyn in May. Gonna start studying law at a uni there."  
  
She clings to my shoulders tightly. Jenny's eyes are wide. Scared. Alone. "Nora," she pleads, and her voice tears down dam. "Nora, no, **please**. You can't ... you can't **leave** me ... "  
  
I weep. She weeps. "They won't **stop** , Jenny."  
  
I've heard stories of firefighters locked in the struggle with PTSD after a traumatic event, but now I'm finally witnessing it firsthand. I see my father's shadow crossing the hallway when I come home late at night. I catch glimpses of my mother looking down at the street from our window some afternoons. Ghosts of children; specters of adults; spirits of the elderly. Those who died needlessly. People we couldn't save. You could not bear the newly dead without feeling it.  
  
I'd always had nightmares, but now the ghosts didn't wait for me to sleep.  
  
"You need a doctor. You need a shrink, Nora. You don't need to **go**!"  
  
But she knew. And I knew. I rarely made a decision that I didn't stand by.  
  
The next month, the whole of Boston Fire Department, Station 1, saw me off at the airport. Jenny and I collapsed into a sobbing mass at the terminal.  
  
_ Nora's shirt hitched around her upper abdomen, bare skin catching flecks of decaying wood that broke off into her flesh. It's a nail-biting experience. But it wasn't enough to dissuade her. Still she thrashed. Still she roared. Still she _threatened death_ until the Libertalia raiders make a sharp turn. They slip into the remnants of a tug boat, now transformed into a makeshift bridge connecting one part of the settlement with the other.  
  
Nora expected them to drag her to the top part of it and cast her off into the ocean like they did Dogmeat. Instead, they haul her below deck. Her gut goes solid. Ice races down her spine.  
  
No sooner had they descended the steps did Gas Mask throw her with all his force - which was impressively a lot, considering his rather lanky frame - against a myriad of barrels. Wood burst. Metal clattered. Her shoulder blades strike something _hard_ and the wind is knocked clean out of her.  
  
Gask Mask nodded to her and his men surround her. One reaches for her Pip Boy, twisting it this way and that in an effort to figure out how to remove it. " _Getthefuckoff!_ " Nora snarled, wrenching her arm away.  
  
The repercussion is immediate. Iron knuckles clashed against her right cheek, snapping her head sharply to the side. Then he twisted her arm backwards, eliciting an agonized howl from her already bloody maw. A victorious sneer painted itself on the bandit's face. He tossed the Pip-Boy to Gask Mask, who turned the object over in his hands with curiosity.  
  
"Only seen this shit on those bunker whaddyacallems - Vault assholes, yea?" Intimidating, burning eyes bore into her. "A greenhorn comin' in here and killin' Gabriel? Fuckin' cunt. Where's yer partner?"  
  
Nick flashed into her brain. It took a long moment to realize he was talking about X6. Nora controlled her breathing, leveled her gaze. White teeth stained red pressed from beneath her lips. Taunting. Jeering. She did not answer.  
  
Gas Mask _'hrmph_ 's. "Gabe was a pussy anyways. Someone was bound to take that shit fer brains out one way or another."

That ... was surprising. Nora glanced this way and that. The other Libertalians are stoic. Calm. They don't look the least bit upset about Gas Mask badmouthing their former leader. Had a coup already been in the process of forming?  
  
"Looks like I didja a favor," she muttered, breaking her tirade of irrational rage for something more ... human, intelligent. "That make you the leader, does it?"  
  
"Yep. On both accounts. So I _guess_ I should be thankin' ya." But he snorts. The others chuckle. "But Gabe, he was a softie. 'Specially fer pretty bitches. Ya came in and _killed_ our men. Maybe he'd'a letcha go on a condition or two. Break yer arm and send ya on yer way. But _shit_ , if I do that then whassat say about our _jolly ol' town_ , huh? That I'm tolerable? That we can ... just ... _let fuckfaces in to screw our shit up_ , and let 'em walk? Nah."  
  
Gask Mask hunched onto his knees. He leaned in and again Nora could see the bleeding black gums and rotting teeth. Ancient meat hangs on his breath. The byproduct of rampant chem use and lack of hygiene.  
  
" _Nah_. Ya fucked with us. And now we gonna fuck with _you_."

Their fury is unmistakable. Fists hardened by ages of living out in the open, earning livings by scraping by and stealing from other via murder or petty theft. Hardened muscles, each packing a different kind of punch. Developed fury, lending more pain to bone-breaking swings. One by one they fall on her - grappling, tearing, _beating_. The numbness of her Psycho-riddled body gave way to hatred, gave way to terror, gave way to hurt and _can't breathe, can't breathe_.  
  
_Age 24. I was halfway through the first semester when I meet a charming young man in the campus cafe. He watches me sip my coffee - extra strong Colombian brew - from across the room. Glances, really, from his book. A shy smile. And the moment I catch him, his gaze jumps away._

_The next day, I see him there. Then the next day. And the day after that. Finally I manage to hold his gaze. I wink, and he gains the courage to stand and come speak to me. "Ma'am, I couldn't help but notice some beautiful eyes staring back at me."_

_His name is Nate Gillespie. He's not really there to study law, but to visit his sister who is, in fact, a student. Lives close by - close enough to stop by every day on his way back from work. A mechanic by trade, Nate is also enlisted in the army and trains at Fort Hamilton._  
  
_A week later he's picking me up after class. We go swing dancing at a club, grab some drinks ... spend the night at his apartment ..._  
  
_Three months later and we're still going strong._

 _Then a year.  
  
Year 2. Age 26. The military comes a-calling. They're shipping him off to Anchorage. I see him off at the airport, where he sweeps me into a long, powerful kiss in front of his fellow men and women ... then drops to his knee ...  
  
_ It was nightfall by the time the beatings stopped. Nora's face felt swollen. Swallowing hurt. Closing her eyes was a project, and opening them was no better. So many bruises coat her petite body that she was certain there was at least a little bit of internal bleeding going on somewhere. The Psycho was long gone from her system. Open injuries caused by gunshots are overshadowed by the harrowing torment felt _all over_.  
  
The way the Libertalia raiders hold back, Nora thought that perhaps they were taking a break ... that maybe even she would be able to get one. To recollect her thoughts. To plot some kind of escape.  
  
Or to cater to that gnawing blackness settling on the periphery of her field of vision.  
  
Fatigue claims her consciousness. Tendrils of smoke grapple her mind, plucking light from the air and replacing it with dark. Her tired body is on the verge of surrendering ... lingering on the precarious ledge between wakefullness and sleep ... when an uncoiling horror renders her stomach unsteady. The Libertalia raiders are drawing towards her again, but their fists aren't swinging and their feet aren't kicking.  
  
Instead their gritty fingers are pulling at the buttons of her shirt, at the zipper of her pants, at ... at ...  
  
_No.  
  
Stop it.  
  
_ Lights out.  
  
_____  
  
They cross paths with Preston Garvey outside of Union Hope Cathedral. MacCready trailed behind the Minuteman, striding side-by-side with the red-headed Cait. Nick was initially relieved as they convene on the church's front steps. Hope was immediately stricken down by pulsating anxiety as Preston shook his head to the detective's queries.  
  
"Nothing," he told them. "Thought we would trace our way back to Sanctuary. She might've made her way there. Got lost on the way. Jumped, maybe?"  
  
"It's a dead end," Nick answers. From the corner of his eyes, he watched Hancock curse and lean against the brick railing. And though Codsworth may be silent, the electromagnetic worry he emanates is enough to send a static through the atmosphere that only Valentine and Curie can feel. "We're headin' back to Castle grounds. Gonna comb everything within the radius."  
  
Preston was the spitting image of a grim fortune-teller.  
  
MacCready cleared his throat. "Already hit 'em. Not one sign. No ghouls clobbered to death with an axe. No spent microfusion cells. Ain't a thing."  
  
If Nick had a heart it would have dropped into his shoes. The Synth equivalent of one stutters and for a second - just a second - the private eye's hands fall to his sides and his entire body goes limp. "How far out did ya check?"  
  
"I had a word with the Atom Cats," Cait added. "They dinnae see nuthin'. Due west is passin' into Gunner territory. That cazador nest innit stirred up. Just patrollin'. Nothing goin' there." Thoughtfully, she pressed a finger to her chin. " _Did_ find this Ghoul kid in a watchacallem ... ' _fridge_ '? He's loafin' 'bout at the Castle."  
  
Garvey set his laser musket on the ground and sat upon the steps. His shoulders fell, defeated, and he crossed his arms across his knees. "Met with Cait at Hyde Park and worked our way west and north. From Fallon's Department Store, north to Diamond City where we regrouped with your sniper." MacCready flashed a short-lived grin. "Nobody's seen her there either, but now they're on high alert. Miss Perkins went straight to scanning the radio for Minutemen broadcasts. Last I saw, Piper was packing her bags. Talking about how she was gonna head to the Castle."  
  
"Also how she was gonna beat the ever-lovin' shi - _hnnn_ \- crap outta 'Blue'." The ex-Gunner made a face. "I headed north to Goodneighbor. Ya already got the good mayor, so ya know how that went down. Tried blazin' a trail north and I _was_ able to find some ghouls that took an axe to the face, but after the Garden Terrace it went cold." He sighed, running a hand along the back of his head. "She ghosted. I don't think she wants to be found."  
  
Tinkering with the loose screw in his scaffolding hand was Nick's closest thing to wringing his fingers together. He thought about puffing another cigarette, but he'd already chain-smoked during the walk-of-shame from Sanctuary and was down to his very last one. The detective was quiet for a long, long time. His processors whined in protest with over-analyzing every thought, every _context_ -  
  
\- _they had pulled him, screaming and pleading, from Jenny's corpse. Utter confusion, utter loss. Blankness. Tormented emotion. What now? What now? Coroners were already on scene. The Medical Examiner placing his fiance in a body bag. His fiance. Lifting her to the gurney, wheeling her into the back of the death mobile ..._

 _Nick was howling. There was no proper way to contain what he was feeling. And there was no way to really **describe** what he was feeling. Anger, that they were claiming her as deceased. "Don't take her away," he was sure he roared at the startled EMS personnel. "What the **hell** are you doing?! You're supposed to bring her **back**?!" He was absolutely positive that he'd slugged a seargent in the face for stepping in front of him. Nick's knuckles were still ringing.  
  
Time dragged. He had gone from weeping, to snarling, to curling into a ball in a matter of hours when, in actuality, it had only been a few scant minutes. Jenny's body was being carted off to the Medical Examiner's office north of Quincy while investigators would scour the scene for clues and keep inquisitive civilians at bay. He knew the procedures. Valentine had watched countless victims of Winter's game encounter the same fate, ride in the back of the same death mobile en route to the same building ...  
  
When Nick tried to stand he was met with a sea of hands attempting to help him. He shoved them off in protest. Turning to find his car, find his ... Three feet. He was back to his knees. Back to groaning. Back to mindlessly clawing at the asphalt as if it would dig up some cure to revive the dead or ... or ...  
  
He knew he was shouting. Knew he also wasn't the only one. People yelling in the crowd. Screeching, "Jenny's dead!" Wailing. The entire police department had known her. Every precinct. Every cop. Every paramedic. Every ... every ...  
  
**Why was that?**  
  
Nick squeezed his eyes shut. Why had everybody known Jenny? Because she was his dame, the one he was so determined the spend the rest of his life with? (They'd talked about having kids. Not even done tying the knot and already plotting the future.) Why? Foggy memories of jeering crowds, him and Jenny surrounded by grinning faces and holding cups of booze and dishing out poker cards and **hot flashes of white that threatened to consume his being** -  
  
Screeching in the distance. Familiarity. A voice he knew. "Get the fuck off me,that's Jen!" Which graduated into a shoving match. Then a brawl. A sea of blue converging upon them, pulling the fighters apart. Platinum blond hair - such a brash contrast to the darker hues of the surrounding - slipping behind a red ... a red truck with flashing lights that trumped all the squad cars challenging it -  
  
_ Sharp pain in his side. Hancock withdrew his elbow with concern. "Heeeey, geezer?"  
  
Nick's glowing oculars snapped to attention. "Huh?"  
  
"You, ah, ya kinda zoned out there. Fry a circuit or something?"  
  
"Uh." The detective clawed at the image hurtling from his memories. It slipped through artificial fingers into a fine, white mist. "I ... y-yeah, guess ya could say that."

Last cigarette be damned. Nick plucked it from the now-empty pack and was shocked to discover that he was _shaking_. It took all the power in the world not to drop his final vestige of reality, and it took a universal grace to manage _lighting_ the hellish thing.

"Mac was suggesting we hit Goodneighbor again. There's a chance she coulda gone further north."  
  
Smoke passed effortlessly through his mouth, ascending to the heavens through the gaping holes in his throat. It was a joke. The nicotine did him neither harm nor good. He lacked the lungs to absorb the chemical, was missing the blood that would circulate it to the rest of his body. Nick had always told Nora that it was a habit developed from watching bits from Real Nick's life. Which was funny. Because now, trying hard to think back on what he had seen ... had he ever actually witnessed Real Nick take a drag of _anything_? _  
  
_ "We'll stop at the Riptide first," Preston's voice clambered through his auditory sensors. "Resupply. Our group's gotten bigger. It won't be wise to continue on with what little we have on us."  
  
Hancock rose a brow. "The Riptide? Ya mean the boat that wrecked into the bridge? Innit crawlin' with raiders?"  
  
"We cleared it out two months ago. It's a Minutemen outpost now."  
  
The Ghoul mayor whistled approval.  
  
Nick's focus rattled to the point that he could no longer entertain the idea of smoking. It was doing very little to quell the uproarious synapses pinging off in his cranial circuitry, so he snubbed it out, stashed it away, and grumbled, "Let's head. We're burnin' daylight."  
  
____  
  
Her mask fogged.  
  
She could smell them from here. Dirty flesh. Nasty diseases. Old, rotten blood. Unclean. Taste bad. But her stomach growled and her claws _itched_ and her teeth _demanded_ to sink into something soft, something bleeding, something _screaming_ , something **_writhing_**.  
  
Night was settling. It didn't take long for alabaster orbs to settle in the darkness. Water lapping at broken piers, knocking around boats that didn't function like proper boats anymore.  
  
Quietness descended on the quirky raider encampment. And then it was gone.  
  
Because there was screaming.  
  
And she felt _rage_ , **_heat_** , **_GONNAKILLYOU_** the lapsed from her gaping jaw with a guttural, snake-like hiss. She knew they had her. Watched them take her after the Big Lightning in the largest raider building. Should have jumped then. Should have _attacked_ at that moment but permission hadn't been given. Not yet. Not yet. They had guns. Lots of hurty guns that stung and killed.  
  
But now ...  
  
But **_now_**.  
  
Nor was hurting. Screams were belting pain and outrage and ... and ... _sorrow_ and ... and ...  
  
Restless claws grazed the radio at her thigh. "Chieee _eeeefyy_?"  
  
It buzzed to life. "Is it dark there yet?"  
  
"Yuppa." Another shriek. Pinpoint teeth gnashed. " _Send me_."  
  
"Remember the rules."  
  
Crouched where she was on the fisherman shack's roof, she bounced restlessly. " _Yesss_. **_Send me_**."  
  
A sigh wafted from the radio. "Be careful, Scarlet. Come back to me in one piece." And then ... _and then_ ... the words she waited for, backed under a hoarseness that commanded the _anger_ she felt. " _Sic 'em_."  
  
  
  
  



	5. The Door the Wakes in Darkness

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Uncomfortable moments abound. There is rape.  
> Nora is drugged. Intermingling thoughts. Beware of confusing sequences.  
> Bonus points if anybody can guess the included game quotes.

　

November, 2073. I just turned 27 the month before. I'm striding out of class when Nate Gillespie greets me outside. He's back from his 12 month deployment, due to return to Anchorage this time next year. Still dressed in full military attire, he sweeps me off my feet in front of my classmates and they _whoop!_ behind me.  
  
It doesn't take him long to keep to his promise. The ring on my finger hasn't been forgotten - not by him, not by me. I've never been huge on big ceremonies. They make me feel awkward. But he won't be shuttered in by my social awkwardness. We are wed at Fort Hamilton: he in a crisp uniform, myself in a beautiful white dress.  
  
Of course Jenny is my Maid of Honor. She 'rallies the troops', so to speak, and manages to get the entirety of Station 1 covered so everybody - and I mean _everybody_ \- can make it to the wedding.

A week after Thanksgiving, I am officially renamed Mrs. Nora Gillespie.  
  
Jennifer Lands catches the bouquet.  
  
We gather at the historic Fraunces Tavern afterwards. Poor barkeeper can't keep up with all of our orders. Jenny regales me with tales of what has happened to the firehouse since I've been gone over shots of cinnamon whiskey.

"Don stepped up," she grins, clinking glasses with me for the fourth time. "Ol' chief retired."  
  
" _Don_ is fire chief now?" I giggle into the burning auburn liquid. "Holy _shit_."  
  
"Hells yea!" Jenny slurs. Her movements are loose. Brazen. There's a confidence in the way she holds herself, something I haven't quite seen before now. The brunette lowers her head, inching towards me and gesturing with 'come hither' fingers. "And guess what?" she whispers.  
  
I lean in and nearly tip my stool. "What?"  
  
"I'm in _training_."  
  
"Fffffooor?"  
  
"Assistant Chief!" Jenny belts out, a little louder than she ought to. She slaps a hand across her mouth and erupts into childish snorts.  
  
I'm overjoyed, wrapping my arms about her (and spilling whiskey all over the place). But I'm also pinned by an obscure sadness that I can't place. Jenny has done so well for herself in the four years I've been gone. Climbing the ranking ladder to become somebody who governs over other members ... There's pride. I can't deny that. I'm _ecstatic_. But it also means she grew: with or without me.  
  
And I was missing it.  
  
His ears must have been ringing, because Donald Mason sneaks up behind me and joins the group hug. "Congratulations, Peanut!"  
  
"Sounds like I should be sayin' the same, _Chief_!"  
  
"Ack! Jenny can't keep a secret for shit!"  
  
"Hey!" the lady in question draws back with a frown. It wobbles quickly back into a smile. "Was in the Bugle and everythin'!"

As the after-party draws on, most of the military men and women retire back to Fort Hamilton or their homes. Firefighters from Station 1 gather round to carpool back to their hotel. Jenny rounds on me with a big sloppy kiss on the way out the door. Donald Mason is behind her. He pecks both my cheeks, then draws me close to whisper in my ear, "If you ever decide to, we've still got a spot open for you." I wonder if he can feel the jolt in my heartbeat, because he adds with a grin, "I'm gonna need a new captain here soon, since Jen's movin' on up."  
  
With the crowd dispersed and the tab paid, Nate wraps his fingers around mine and leads me out. His army buddies decided to go old school with post-marriage celebrations. Tin cans are tied to the rear bumper of his car and 'Just Married' is scrawled messily on the back windshield with what looks to be cake frosting.

I may not be a fan of the big ceremony, but being carried bridal style through the front door by somebody I love was something I don't think I can ever get over.

Nate allows me enough time to strip off the wedding dress and clean the makeup off my face before 'assaulting' me in the hallway. It's been a year since we've had sex and it shows in his hard, pressured touches. His lovemaking has always been on the rough side. When we're sprawled post-coitus for the first time as a married couple, I'm sporting fresh bruises on my hips.

Slick with sweat he rolls away and faces me from the opposite side of the bed. I know not to touch him while we're like this. He's not a fan of feeling hot, sticky, and crowded after the act. Our hands linger towards each other, just barely grazing. Adoration runs thick in his eyes.  
  
Minutes pass before he swallows and lolls his head towards the ceiling. "Have you ever ... thought of going back to Boston?" he asks abruptly. It catches me off guard. Had he heard Donald's proposition?  
  
"Have ... I?"  
  
"Yeah. I mean ... it is your hometown. You've gotta miss it, right?"

I can't tell whether I'm being placed in an interrogation room or being asked an innocent question. His voice is off. Something about his body language. I can't make it out. But I slide onto my back and fold my arms under my head. The ceiling fan whips cool air around my damp breasts. "Sure, I've ... you know, _entertained_ it. Fleeting thoughts. Who wouldn't?" My tongue flicks out over my lips. They feel dry. They'll be chapped tomorrow. "But we're here in the Big Apple. And I'm _happy_ here. With you."  
  
"Are you?" Why the air of uncertainty from his voice?  
  
My eyes lock onto his. I'm grinning. "Of course. Aren't you?"  
  
It takes him a moment. A moment too long. My heart thuds painfully, ebbing into relief when he smirks and whispers, "Every second."  
  
There's something hanging in the air that I don't like. He doesn't like contact after we've screwed around, but I press a finger softly into his ribs anyway. "What's eatin' you, Nate?"  
  
"Nothing." And he winks. His tone returns to normal, expression relaxed. "Don't worry about it, lovey."  
  
So I didn't.  
  
___  
  
Nora's body was sympathetic. It kept her in a hibernated status during the initial violation ... up until the Libertalia raiders discovered her Psycho track marks and gleefully gained the idea to pump her full of chemical endorphins to 'snap her back' to life.

Liquid fire coursed through her veins. She bolted onto her rear: breathing labored; pupils transfixed and pinpricked; cardiac muscles pounding so _fiercely_ that her chest might just **explode**. There were little stabbing sensations coating the whole of her body - bites of hundreds of thousands of fleas that weren't there. _Itchy_.  
  
Movement across the room. A raider stirring, hands jammed down his pants. In an instant his image changes into somebody else. _Anybody_ else. Jason Mackentyre, sneering insults about her dead mother. Mr. Lands, hands red from striking Jenny across the face. Eddie Winter, laughing and grappling a very dead Nick by the skull. Old Nick? New Nick? His face kept changing from flesh to rubber to veins to wires and _her head was throbbing_ and **_she couldn't hold it in_**.  
  
Fury was a terrible mask. Nora wore it when she leaped for him. Or she would have. One large hand tightened around her throat from behind. It yanked. She lost her screech to a tightened trachea. Hard wood met her back, knocking what little wind was left clear from her lungs. Large, wet lips overlapped own. Something slimy, something _wriggling_ slipped past her jaw to penetrate her throat and Nora gagged, twisted, _growled_.  
  
It was the Psycho that spurred her into biting down on the offending tongue with brute force, but it was her hazy recollections of _before_ , where vengeance was countered with swift and merciless retribution. With beatings. With disrobement. With ... with ...  
  
She was made aware of the bruises when the raider tore away with a holler. There was pain in places where they hadn't been before. Between her thighs was a firestorm of agony. Nagging irritation clawed at her forearms. Nora's side was a hot, bloody mess. Her right hand would not move properly without inciting tears. Lips were swollen. Eyes so blackened they could barely close properly.

Nora whimpered, cowering away like a beaten mongrel, arms folding over her head in an effort to protect her from what she knew would come. And come they did ... first with the hurricane of knuckles darkening preexisting contusions ... then with the more primal violations of her nakedness. She resolved to give them no satisfaction by forcing herself not to react to the latter. Perhaps they would go away if they got bored. But then they would spike her with torture ... cigarette butts ... sharpened knives ... One favored firing off a gun, then holding the burning muzzle against her hip. And there was always Psycho. They poked and prodded until she thrashed and screeched and they would cheer about how, "It's like ridin' a rabid Brahmin!"  
  
Her body simply could not keep up. Whenever Nora's eyes threatened to close, therein came another shot of one thing or another. Then another. And another, until Nora pondered less about escape and more about how many Psychos it would take to just _kill_ her. If she was lucky, maybe they weren't counting. Just one hit too many. That was all she wanted. One hit too many, and she could finally sleep.

She could finally sleep and go back to a place where Shaun was a baby again. Nora would take him and run from the nukes, run from Vault 111. Run from Kellogg, from the Institute. Run, _run_ , **_run_**!  
  
_She wouldn't have to wake up_.  
  
Night unfolded. At least that was what Nora guessed. Every time a raider would leave or arrive from above deck, she could catch a glimmer of sunlight. Then no light. There was a choir of birds, then an orchestra of crickets. A chilly afternoon breeze replaced with the cold wind rolling in from the moonlit sea.  
  
Nobody was coming for her.  
  
X6-8 wouldn't return. Shaun, no, _Father_ wouldn't be concerned enough to send for aid. (Would he? No ... ) No ... She was too much of a liability. A loose cannon. A failure _because she didn't wake up sixty years earlier to save her baby before he became what he was, and what kind of mother just lets that happen? A shitty one, that's who._  
  
Nick Valentine wouldn't come busting down the door. He probably thought she'd gone the crazy route like some of his previous clients when greeted with foul news, donned his coat and left for Diamond City. Word would spread of her connections to the Synth-generating facility. Piper would hate her. Preston would hate her. MacCready would scowl, disgusted he'd dared to trust somebody so insidious. One by one they would waltz off over the horizon without her.  
  
_Nate ... gaslighting her when confronted with evidence: lipstick on his collar, confiscated by Codsworth when doing laundry and presented to his mistress when she was alone. "Do you really think I would do that to you?" her husband snapped. "What kind of psycho bitch are you?"  
  
_ The latest Libertalian grunted and withdrew. His successor stepped up to the plate, frowning when Nora did little but roll her head to the side. "Gahdamnit. Givver anudda pop, Tak."  
  
_The way his lips twisted into a hateful sneer when she'd found them in bed together not three hours after Jenny's corpse was hauled away to the funeral home. "This is **your** fault!"_

One more needle. One more explosion of molten blood. One more convulsion of the chest, tightening of the airway -  
  
_Nora stirred from the couch the next morning. Cheeks still damp. Eyes still puffy. The house was empty save for a still-sleeping Shaun and her Mister Handy butler. Codsworth greeted her with a hot cup of joe and the most sympathetic, most heartfelt words possible for a robot. "Mum, I don't - this whole scenario is simply - just ... I do not under **stand** what has gotten into Sir ... "_  
  
\- except it kept getting tighter. Nora gasped. This was it, _this was it_ -  
  
"Shit, gimme a stim! Gimme a stim!"  
  
_"But as long as my fusion core keeps me afloat, I'll always be here beside you. I promise you that."_

Dark. Cold. _The cryostasis chamber sealed shut before her. Ice traced up the window first, up her legs next.  
  
Can't ...  
  
Move ...  
  
Shaun._  
  
______  
  
_"They all set?" Nora asked as MacCready joined her outside of the Old Willow. Why the Vaultdweller decided to name the monster of a fauna such a self-descriptive name baffled the sniper. But for somebody who called her hound 'Dogmeat', he guessed he shouldn't be too surprised.  
  
MacCready ducked under one of the low sweeping branches of the pre-war behemoth, wiping summer sweat from his brow. "Didn't know what to do with all the weapons you laid on 'em."  
  
"If they're goin' to D.C., who the hell knows what they're going to find?"  
  
"More of the same, I bet." With a thoughtful pause, he added, "With less Slavers."  
  
Nora shuddered. "I still can't believe that shit."  
  
"Didn't think people'd stoop low enough to slap explosive collars on other people?" Mac sneered. "Just glad Tenpenny Tower burned to the ground."  
  
"Humanity is a fucked venture."  
  
"You speak the truth, girl."  
  
She beamed, all bright teal eyes and shiny hair. MacCready would have felt himself swoon if not armed with the experience of rejection. He'd made several passes at her. Twice during their adventure to and from the Glowing Sea, which was met with shy chuckles and a very **odd** sidelong glance from Valentine.  
  
The third and final flirt was in MedTek. They'd just acquired the cure for Duncan's blight. Emboldened by his victory (and Med-X) high, MacCready had gripped Nora around the waist and pulled her in for a kiss. Their lips were only inches away before she ducked her head and confessed to not feeling whatever spell it was that he was under. _

_Disappointing. But he didn't press the issue. Nora was a rare bird. Some wings weren't meant to be clipped.  
  
The incident didn't cause any long-term damage. If anything, that fine line drawn in the sand helped set some barriers ... and strengthen other bonds. Awkward, uncomfortable conversations became talk about babies (Shaun learning to crawl, Duncan's first steps). Quiet nights recuperating at a Minutemen settlement were spent planning out the future while stargazing. More often than not they would doze off on each other, drooling like voracious beasts with an endless supply of saliva and snores loud enough to wake the Deep Ones.  
  
If Preston came upon them first, he would poke them softly until they came to. Often Nick would greet their bleary-eyed stirring with a smirk and terrible Dad Jokes. But it was Cait's habit of dumping cold water on them that eventually forced the duo to sleep lightly.  
  
A platonic relationship, Codsworth had called it. He got it once the Mister Handy actually told him what the hell that word meant. And it fit. Didn't keep him from wishing it was more a romantic type. And it certainly failed to halt the jealousy he felt when Nora fell quietly asleep against Valentine, his faulty arm draped protectively over her while her head nestled into his chest.  
  
Why he felt outgunned by a raggedy **Synth** , he didn't know.  
  
"Why didja wanna meet here?"  
  
Nora pulled at the shoulder of his jacket, gesturing for him to follow. "Wanted to give something to you."  
  
"Oooh, a gift? Is it a mole rat?"  
  
"Yep, even got a pretty pink bow on it."  
  
They came to a stop outside one of Sanctuary Hills' last remaining pre-war houses. It was in considerably better shape than it's cousins and shown more TLC than the scrap metal-built shacks. MacCready knew this because it used to be Nora's own home. The one she reared her missing son in. The one she nested with her husband in.  
  
"Been talking to Nick about some stuff," Nora told him. Her voice was chipper but her eyes were far away. "About what's gonna come after we find my boy. Got me to thinking, you know? What's gonna happen to the Commonwealth now that the Minutemen are nearly back in full swing. About where I'm gonna wind up standing in all of this."  
  
MacCready looked around to see if the Synth in question was within earshot. It took him a second longer to remember that he'd gone back to Diamond City to straighten up an awaiting case while Nora handled Minutemen business. Supplies for the Institute teleporter were still being scrounged up. They still had time to kill.  
  
"So whatcha gettin' at?"  
  
"You're gonna need a place to raise Duncan. A place that's protected."  
  
"Yeah?"  
  
Nora gave between his shoulder blades a shove. "Here it is."  
  
The ex-Gunner stared blankly. Her words didn't quite click with him until she was practically pushing him through the door. "Whoah, Nora, wait! This is - this is - !"  
  
"Yours now."  
  
"This is **your** old place!"  
  
"Keyword: 'old'." There was a solemn disposition about her. High cheekbones seemed to sink. Shadows around her eyes deepened. "It's not my home anymore."  
  
"It'll always be your place!" he protested.  
  
"Mac, I've been trying to fix it up just right since I got out of the Vault. I can't go a day without thinking I'm hearing Shaun crying or ... or ... " Nora swallowed. "I get nightmares sometimes. See and hear things I'm not supposed to. There's too many memories in these walls. Not a lot of them are good."  
  
They were in the kitchen. Several of the gadgets were still hooked up through the ceiling, though not a single one of them worked. It was impossible to imagine Nora sitting here 200 years ago, drinking something they called 'coffee' and reading the Boston Bugle when it was still being produced.  
  
"I can't stay in this place, Mac. It needs a new owner - somebody that's gonna sink life into it. I don't know how long it'll be before I have Shaun again. But Duncan? He's coming soon. And his Pops is gonna need somewhere to raise him right." She grinned. "We've got walls around Sanctuary now. And enough turrets to light up a Super Mutant camp. Marcy's going to start up school. It'll be perfect."  
  
He nodded numbly. His throat was tight. "But ... you? Where'll you go?"  
  
"Not sure yet," Nora answered sheepishly. "I kind of drift for now. Got a few options pinged out but nothing definite. Maybe we'll just build something from scratch right here if I can't figure anything else out, huh?"  
  
MacCready didn't know what to say.  
  
So with tears in his eyes, he enveloped her in a soul-crushing hug instead.  
  
_ _____  
  
Valentine and Co. hadn't been long at the S.S. Riptide colony when Ellie Perkin's voice crackled over the communal ham radio. "Urgent message for Nick Valentine, please relay!"  
  
The detective all but bowled over the poor Minuteman managing the device, sputtering apologies while simultaneously wrestling the microphone from the surprised youth's hand. (What were you supposed to do when a mangled cyborg of a man came charging up?)  
  
Dogmeat turned up outside of Diamond City's gates. Poor hound didn't get more than a few inches past the threshold when he collapsed due to his injuries. Blood and open sores matted his fur. His left hind leg was shattered in at least three different spots. A portion of his ribcage floated in a different direction than the rest of his chest during breaths.  
  
MacCready thanked Takahashi - if the Protectron could even understand gratitude - and ambled his way up the stadium steps, down through the hallway, and out to where the Goodneighbor mayor awaited. Hancock would never be allowed admission into the Ghoul-forbidden necropolis. Thankfully the restriction ended at the security station outside - that, or the Guards didn't give much of a shit.  
  
Probably the latter, considering how the tricorn-laden leaned across the counter, yucking it up with a bald batter-upper with tacky shades.  
  
The soup's brothy aroma distracted Hancock. Hands that looked like they'd been dipped in battery acid snatched the extra bowl from MacCready, haphazardly sloshing boiling hot liquid to the point of almost-but-not-quite spilling.  
  
"Thank fucking _god_." Mangled lips slurped down the famed Diamond City street food. Hancock's head jerked skyward and sucked in air, evidently forgetting just how _hot_ soup was supposed to be. " _Shit_."  
  
MacCready chortled, blowing across his own bowl. "Moron."  
  
"That's Mayor Moron, shitface." Hancock's breath whistled frantically across the noodles. "C'mon. Papa's a-hungry."  
  
"Shoulda eaten those mole rat chunks I offered ya at Riptide."  
  
"I got standards, ya know."  
  
"Pretty low ones."

The mayor thought for a second. "Yeah. Got me there."  
  
Piper grunted to their left. She had greeted them at the front entrance, bogged down with one very heavy-looking duffel bag chock full of a variety of supplies: stimpacks, a doctor's bag, extra ammunition, extra _guns_ that she supposedly 'borrowed' from Arturo. She didn't talk specifics, so they didn't ask.  
  
It lay at her feet now but was not the reporter's center of attention. Piper's eyes were on the bald guard, staring the back of his head down so hard that MacCready half-thought it might spawn eyes of its own and glare back. "I've never seen him before," she whispered.  
  
"Coulda just joined."  
  
"Gotta get Macdonough's approval to be a guard."  
  
"What, they gotta take a test?"  
  
"You could ... _say_ that."

Piper's reputation preceded her. MacCready knew all about 'The Synthetic Truth' and the myths it sprouted ... mostly because he continuously filched copies of it from off Nick's desk when they visited Diamond City, which was often. He was pretty sure the detective was aware of it, because there in the last few months there would be two copies of each new edition instead of one, and Valentine would always greet him with a half-lidded gaze that said, 'I know what the hell you're doing, you great annoying ass. I'm not a goddamn detective for nothing.'

Whatever. MacCready liked Piper's _The Woman Out of Time_ the most.  
  
"Soooo ... you think he's a Synth too?" MacCready pressed through a mouthful of noodles.  
  
The reporter's head jerked backwards, midnight-hued brown hair bobbing in tune with her fiery eyes. "Don't you? Guy shows up outta nowhere, and _bam_ he's on guard duty? It doesn't add up."  
  
"Maybe the guy just grovelled for a job. Got kids to feed or somethin'."  
  
" _Orrr_ he's secretly on Macdonough's payroll."  
  
"Can we _please_ shut up about that _sonuvabitch_ mayor?" Hancock growled with a fork in his mouth.  
  
Yeah. No. "Why don'cha ask Nicky to check him?" MacCready shrugged. "Tail him or somethin'."  
  
Piper scoffed. She had spunk about her, that he had to admit. "If he's an Institute _spy_ then I'm sure seeing an Institute throwaway stalking him is gonna set off all the alarm bells."  
  
"Okay, so maybe not follow him. They could just ... talk wires or ... or motherboards or Assaultron pin-ups or whatever the hell Synths talk about. Warm him up so he spills the beans."  
  
"First," a gravelly voice manifested behind them, "not all Synths are made of metal bits and coolant pumps, you gigantic racist." A great shadow loomed over them, spiderlike fingers tugging at the tip of its fedora. The closer the steel man got, the smaller his projection became. "Second, the ones that _are_ have all the charisma of a talking elevator. 'Cept for yours truly."  
  
Valentine stood shoulder-to-shoulder with MacCready. The ex-Gunner gawked. "You just called your own kind a bunch of dull idiots. Ain't that racism, you hypocrite?"  
  
Yellow eyes flickered. " _Big word_ , MacCready. I'm impressed."  
  
"Oh go spit out toast, you Grandpa Toaster."  
  
As Preston crept from behind to join them, Hancock cleared his throat. "What's the word?"  
  
"Dogmeat's worse for wear." Nick's expression was grim. It was an unfortunate constant for their current adventure. "Whoever they bumped into wasn't exactly ... _friendly_ towards animals."  
  
"Pup gonna be okay?"  
  
"Doc Sun protested the livin' hell outta treating him, insisting he ain't a vet. Thank heavens Ellie's got a way with words. Her patience was more _amiable_ than mine at the moment. She convinced him. Curie's gonna stick around. Got a lot of medical knowledge in those memory banks of her's." Valentine cut loose a long sigh from phantom lungs. "Still, he's not gonna be right as rain for at least two weeks."  
  
" _Two weeks_?!" MacCready protested, setting down his bowl. "We can't sit around for that long while Nora's - " dirty fingers gesticulated to the massive skyscape of looming buildings " - out _there_!"  
  
"And we're not gonna," the detective barked, shooting the Gunner down with a look that was appalled by the insinuation. "We don't have the pup's nose, so we're gonna follow yer lead as best we can 'til he's healed up." Rubber fingers touched bare metal ones. Uneasy. "In case we ... don't find her by that point ... then we're gonna enlist Dogmeat. Follow the trail like he did with Kellogg."  
  
Piper hefted the bag to her shoulder. "I'm in. You said you lost her tracks heading north, past Goodneighbor?"  
  
MacCready nodded. "What about Codsbot?"  
  
"Stickin' around with Ellie for now. He's no Sentry Bot. Worried he'll wind up more of a burden than an advantage."  
  
"I'll be breaking off from you once we get close to Trinity Plaza," Preston cut in. He didn't look happy with what he was about to say, by any means. "The Castle is being loaded down with requests for assistance. Raiders in the Quincy vicinity are getting bold. There's rumor they're trying to start a fight with the Gunners currently occupying it, and are striking at settlements trying to steal their supplies for the coming battle."  
  
MacCready clicked his tongue. No doubt the vagabond bandits would lose, so strong was their competition. The time was drawing near when snuffing out the Gunner compound might be unavoidable. But that was a topic for another day: when they weren't fending off boiling blood and oil or crushing the rising loss of hope.  
  
Twilight was overtaking the sky. Stars twinkled in the heavens - tiny atomic reactions so far away yet so outlandishly beautiful. Nora had taught MacCready about their composure one night when Nick hovered over her shoulder to correct the little details she erred on. One by one they'd pointed out ancient constellations he never even heard of, reciting folklore and myths, each more fabulous than the last. The way those two picked up where the other left off ... how they quipped some long-forgotten factoids and chuckled at jokes that were out of MacCready's century ... they were a pair from a different era that somehow belonged, perfectly, where they were.  
  
Two cogs in a machine that couldn't function without its dual parts. MacCready wondered if Nick realized it too, from the way his metallic jaw worked silently in frustration.  
  
_Yeah_ , MacCready thought with chagrin rising like bile, _No wonder Nora ain't interested in me._ Knowingly or unknowingly, in one way or another, she already had eyes somewhere else.  
  
____  
  
_Darkness brings the choking heat._  
  
____  
  
_Cold worse than any kind of void was accompanied by blackness. Then blackness gave way to warmth. Fire. Smoke. Choked at first by her diaphragm's inability to move with the ice, smothered now by the vibrations of her dying SCBA pack. It became harder and harder for her to suck in air. The mask was pulling to her face with each strained breath._

 _Jenny was calling over the radio. Her voice broke up. Undeciphered. "Nora - can hear - where - ?"  
  
_ ____  
  
_Awakening the hungry beast._  
  
____  
  
_Charcoal smoke. Low and hot. Pinpricks on her skin. Blistering the flesh._

 _She tried to crawl but didn't make it far. Her leg hurt too much. Her arm no longer functioned at her command. Breathing was a labor. Instead she rested on her back, trying to recover or calm her chest enough to relax ... conserve the oxygen she had left.  
  
Sparks of red curled from the ceiling: length tendrils of flame that licked, snapped back, strayed out a little further the next time. Each stretch from above became a little bolder. The whole of her surroundings were following suit, braver from the example set out before them. Her ears were burning.  
  
Focus. Inhale.  
  
Nothing.  
  
A jarring, quaking noise from behind her. Then another. For each roaring thunderclap was another bounce of fire. The inferno would not be outdone.  
  
Then an explosion. The briefest expanse of light. Scarlet O'Sullivan's voice hollered out into the nothingness. "Norby, I'm comin'!"  
  
But the starving pyre flung to life, invigorated by this sudden rush of fresh air. And Nora's whole world became a blur of reds and oranges and yellows and **hot, scathing, burning** -  
  
_ ___  
  
_Open time's door to beckon prey.  
  
_ ___  
  
"Norby?"  
  
Nora Gillespie, formerly Nora Hynes, cracked open her swollen eyes.  
  
A pair was staring back at her: stark white with the faintest milky green sclera circling the center. Watching her from beyond a screen.  
  
_Blink._  
  
Not a screen. A mask. Some kind of translucent material. It pitched forward over the mouth, forming a hardened circle as if meant to attach to something.  
  
_Blink._ Nora's mouth was dry. She licked her lips and wasn't surprised at the lack of saliva.  
  
Hard fingers dug into her shoulder. Hot iron struck tired olfactories. The air was thick with it. Nora cringed. The hand retracted with a moan. "Norrrbyyyy?"  
  
" ... focus ... ," she whispered to herself. It was meant to be a thought but came as a vocalization instead.  
  
Memories drifted in and out like broken film off a projector. Probing fingers - terrifying grins - needles - blood - fists ... She ran her dry tongue over her teeth, whimpered at the feel of several jagged edges greeting her. Her throat burned.  
  
The hand returned, accompanied by its partner. They rested on either side of her bruised face. Nora felt the bones of her jaw grind under them, and she cried out.  
  
That voice again. Raspy. Bright. Excited. "Hee _eeeey_!" A blossoming whisper.  
  
_Blink._  
  
The whisper belonged to a beaming smile. Big white teeth. Big _sharp_ white teeth, belonging to a tight, smooth crimson face that housed a pair of black-encircled sunken white eyes and a pit for a nose. All tucked behind a mask - a mask she knew - a mask that -  
  
_\- they had pulled it off her when they dragged her out the building and started CPR. Pops wore one too. The coroners didn't say, but Nora knew they'd had to peel it off of his singed flesh -  
  
_ All of this mess of a face topped by a mop of pale yellow hair that was tousled. Streaked with red. _Wet_ redness. Fresh. Unnatural.  
  
Blood.  
  
Their surroundings _BOOMED_ into perspective. There were bodies surrounding them: writhing; moaning; crying. Shouts outside that drew closer and closer. Heavy footfalls on the makeshift planks. They sounded angry. _Vengeful_. More raiders. More raiders that would ...  
  
This was still Libertalia. She could still smell the ocean, but now it was ruined by the stench of twisted flesh and exposed veins.  
  
Nora's entire body succumbed to an earthquake. "Nonononono - !"  
  
But the fingers on her cheeks trailed away and Nora noticed how _hard_ they felt. Like bone. Like knives. They followed her shoulders, sought out her hands. The grip with which they squeezed them with was gentle enough not to send her mangled wrist into a frenzy of agony.  
  
The blood-hued creature rose Nora's hands for her. Gingerly they were set upon the mask. Tactfully placed so that her fingers rested on the black-lined edges. She could feel the latches there. Familiarity stormed her heart: a lonely poltergeist; a ghost that shouldn't be.  
  
And then the thing - the monster, the woman, the whatever-it-was, leaned forward and begged, " _Release_."  
  
Nora hesitated. "Re ... lease?"  
  
Cream egg hair bounced with its ecstatic nod. " _Release_."  
  
She couldn't think to explain this. It made no sense, yet it made perfect sense. Psycho remnants pulsated in her circulatory system. Bruises and welts became painfully self-aware with each second that ticked by. An anger. A _need_. Questionable emotions that appeared, momentarily, mirrored by this _thing_ before her.  
  
Nora pulled the latches and the mask loosened. The creature slid its head backwards. Its 'muzzle' fell to the floor.  
  
Fuzziness, queasiness - they fell upon Nora at the raw sight of this thing kneeling before her: at the dagger-like dentures, at the post-mortem eyes.  
  
Smoke slunk around the edges of her vision. The creature's white teeth pressed through the fogginess, gluing to the backs of her eyelids as the grin of a Cheshire Cat.  
  
Through the onslaught of her unconsciousness, Nora started to hear the screams.  
  
___  
  
_"_ _So what's this all about, Knickknack?"_

 _They couldn't adventure across the Commonwealth every day. When the leads went dry, when they were too weary to press on, when time and patience forced them to sit and do nothing, she and Nick would part ways. It was always temporary. Half the time she would loaf about Valentine Detective Agency, grooming over case files with him. When it wasn't Nora stalking about in his shadow, it was Nick who slunk about whatever Minutemen encampment Nora had made home for the moment: overseeing repairs, mingling with the townsfolk, but mostly bantering with his partner-in-training._  
  
_They'd earned some very strange, piercing glances over the months._  
  
_But lingering in Nick's basking presence was warming. Even when MacCready clung to the sides, routinely crawling his way under the detective's synthetic skin. Or when Piper slammed Nora with question after question about pre-war America._  
  
_It was a nice reprieve after every day when they returned without Shaun._  
  
_"Just a curiosity," Nick mused, drumming steel digits across his desk._  
  
_"What about?"_  
  
_"Once we find your boy." It was always **When** with Nick. Not **If**. "Whatcha plannin' to do?"_  
  
_"What, like ... am I gonna keep a full-time job or be a housewife?" Nora snorted. "Taco Tuesdays. Go see a ball game. Fishing on the weekends."_  
  
_"Har."_  
  
_"Teach him how to bug ol' Uncle Nick."_  
  
_The Synth's eyes positively twinkled. "Uncle, huh?"_  
  
_"Well, it'd be Grandpa, but ... " Nora tossed him a wink. "Ya look strikingly young."_  
  
_"Oh, flattery will get you everywhere." She sipped a Nuka Quantum. Out of habit, Nora offered him a sip. The detective waved a hand. "Still can't drink, doll."_  
  
_"And yet I can still imagine you chugging a pot of coffee."_  
  
_"Real Nick probably woulda killed 'em by the dozen."_  
  
_She shot him a look. " **Old** Nick. You're the real Nick now, Nick ... knack." Chug. "Paddy whack. Give a dog a bone."_  
  
_Nick could never pull an eye roll in the right way. His lit pupils would glitch in a circle, but never slide seamlessly. "Leave this poor old man alone. And answer my question. Seriously now."_

 _The Vaultdweller kicked back in the chair. Things were different now than they had been when the detective first fired off questions across his desk. The knot in her chest was diminishing. Promising certainty claimed the spot where it once hung. "I dunno. Helping lead the Minutemen is a sweet gig, but ... "_  
  
_"But?"_  
  
_"I was put on the spot for it. Still feel uneasy running the show. And if I'm being honest, Preston's the real front man. I think he's putting me ahead of him so that all eyes are on me instead of him." She pursed her lips, flipping the bottlecap over in her hand. "He's not exactly a 'crowd' type. Gets nervous, I've noticed." Nora hummed under her breath. "I want to be a good role model for Shaun. He needs a cause to look up to as he gets older."_

 _"But Garvey has a tendency to pressure you with multiple missions at once." Nick's gaze softened with concern. "Stretching yourself too thin can drastically shorten your lifespan, ya know."_  
  
_"No kiddin'. I'm thinking, further down the road ... there will be enough Minutemen to divy these quests onto without putting too much burden on any one man. Or woman. And then we can start promoting people to ranks like Lieutenant and whatnot." Nora paused. "And then ... I think I might hang up my hat, so to say."_  
  
_"Oh?"_  
  
_"Pass the torch."_  
  
_"Preston?"_  
  
_"Yeah."_  
  
_The detective grinned. "Honestly, once he gets the hang of it, he'd be a fantastic general. I'd miss the old one though. An original femme fatale."_  
  
_Nora flamboyantly wave of her hand. "Oh, you absolute hound." Nick laughed._  
  
_"Well, for what it's worth, you've always got a place here."_  
  
_She sat upright, completely at attention. "Say what now?"_  
  
_"Back when you saved this old damsel in distress, Ellie mentioned - in passing - that I might need a partner." He cleared his 'throat', averting his gaze. "We've - ah - joked about 'partner this' and 'detective that', but I'd be lyin' if I said I ain't been considerin' it these past few months."_  
  
_"You're kidding."_  
  
_"I kid you not. Y-You're good people. Do right by strangers. That hasn't gone unnoticed, doll." Nora stared into her bottle. Nick suddenly felt skittish. "Just an offer. Ya don't gotta say yes. I mean, unless you wanna."_  
  
_But the platinum-haired vixen swirled her soda and listened to it fizz. Teal eyes were wide, smile cocked to the side with teeth showing. "You've given me something to think on, Nick. Detective Nora's got a nice ring to it."_  
  
_He folded his arms on the desk and supported his chin on his conjoined fists. "Detectives Nick n' Nora."_

 _"Detectives Nick n' Nora. Alliteration is your destination."_  
  
_"Lord, give me the strength. What have I started?"_  
  
___  
  
Nora had fallen asleep. Or she slipped unconscious. There was truly no way of telling anymore.

But when she came to, her first glimpse around provided her with the hope that it was all some unpleasant nightmare and she was really just back at the Valentine Detective Agency. Instead, a floor filled with cold bodies greeted her with horrifying brutality.  
  
Cold bodies.  
  
They hadn't been dead before.  
  
_A red figure with a fire mask._  
  
That hadn't been a hallucination.  
  
"Hello?" she called out into the room. Nora was still below deck of an old tugboat. Still in Libertalia. She could hear the waves sloshing against the ship. But that was _all_ she could hear.  
  
No. That was a lie. If she strained, she could make out the distant sound of gunfire ... veiled screaming, muted by distance and ... _snarling_.  
  
The Psycho must have worn off. Whatever fog she had been in earlier had evaporated. It was a small wonder she hadn't been killed by an overdose, although there was a bite to her mind that wondered if it would have been so bad. Nora felt filthy. Thousands of invisible bugs were crawling over her flesh. Poison around her. Venom _inside_ her. Cold and naked and -  
  
She rolled onto her side and vomited. _Retched_ , more like. Nothing but bile and blood.  
  
An eternity later and she was crawling across the floor. Scarlet coated her knees, her palms. Blood coated the wooden boards so thickly in spots that she slipped onto her stomach, red sloshing between her breasts and spreading across her belly. And then there were the thicker bits: the chunks of flesh; eviscerated intestines and, in one case, what she thought to be part of a _heart_.  
  
These raiders had not been dead before. Nora clearly remembered seeing them squirming, groaning in agony. There had been blood, but not this much. Gore didn't exist. But now ... parts of their faces were missing. Their throats were ripped into. Whole limbs were dismembered, gone AWOL. Partially devoured, courtesy of jaw marks. It was a scene out of a _Texas Chainsaw Massacre/Night of the Living Dead_ crossover.  
  
Relief (and sadness) at survival was becoming sheer terror. Whatever had done this ... was probably still around. Hiding around the corner. Ready to ambush her. Eager to finish the job the Raiders had started.  
  
_Ought to let them do it.  
  
_ But while her brain went one way, her body went another. There was no finding her clothes in this mess, and she wasn't so desperate as to pull torn and soaked garments from the dead. Most of them were so shredded to pieces that they wouldn't offer protection anyhow. Not from an attack. Definitely not from the elements.  
  
"Up an at 'em," Nora whispered to herself. No way out but up through the hatch. And if she was gonna go outside in mid-Autumn with nothing but what she was born with ... so be it.  
  
She pushed herself to her feet. Hot pokers of unhealed, festering wounds slung her back onto the ground with a howl.  
  
"Shit."  
  
_Once again, come on girl!_  
  
Her effort was more cautious this time. Slowly sliding her legs up so that her knees touched her chest, Nora balance on her forearms, pressed skybound ... Immediately her right leg buckled, a wound from ages past aggravated by a gaping bullet hole carelessly slapped with old, dirty gauze by some hand that was not her own (and was probably currently missing from on of those raiders in the room). Her knee slammed down. Hard. The force of the impact jarred her entire right side. Spots where old blood caked tore and stretched. New, fresher red squeezed through the newly-made openings  
  
Nora's ears were ringing. Her head, pounding. An uncontrollable agony. White spots blinded her double-vision. She clutched at her forehead, dragged it against the floor in an effort to _stop it_ , _stop the hurt_. Screaming. Close. Loud. It took a long time to realize it was coming from her.  
  
No Pip-Boy. No teleporting away with the embedded Courser chip. Not that it was an option. Not that she wanted to see Father. Not that she wanted to see the enslaved Synths.

No weapons. No fire axe. No flare gun. Couldn't signal for help. _How was she even still alive?  
  
_ Maybe it was the Psycho. Maybe if she found more ...  
  
The very idea brought lava down upon her forearms. She cried into the wood, nostrils thick with the scent of sliced flesh: like a Radstag when MacCready field-dressed it. Nora threw up again.  
  
_Get up!_  
  
Back to her knees - stomach contents slick against her flesh. Up ... up ... _No_. Back down. Back to struggling. Back to being useless. Failure: as a friend, as a survivor, _as a mother_ -  
  
_Shaun being wrenched from Nate's arms, the bullet tearing through his father's brain -_  
  
_Get up!_  
  
Nora crawled. Her fingers grazed the ladder leading to the hatch. She gripped with her left, pulled up with her right. Destroyed cartilage crunched. " _Ha_ \- !"  
  
A thunder crack. Blinding light sneaking in from the cracks of the door above.  
  
_Standing at the funeral for Jennifer Lands. Drinking at the late-night vigil for the missing Nick Valentine. Solemn words. Promises of vengeance.  
  
_ Cold wind licked her bare back. The hatch was opened to a midnight sky. Nora could not look up. It hurt to move her head. The red-skinned woman was back to finish her final victim. Or Gas Mask, returned for one final penetration before slitting her throat and dumping her in the ocean with Dogmeat.  
  
The voice she heard instead was even less welcome.  
  
Yet she was awash with relief.  
  
"Father was concerned with your lack of appearance," droned X6-88 from above. "Had I known what befell you, I would have returned sooner."  
  
Nora choked. "You ... "  
  
The Courser's leather jacket crinkled as he climbed down beside her. He stood in silence for a moment - either observing the scenery or shaking his head in disappointment at her prone form - before leaning down to slip an arm under her stomach. She was hoisted onto his shoulder with a little more gentleness than he would have given him credit for.  
  
Father had been concerned.  
  
_Shaun_ was concerned.  
  
Butterflies of hope fluttered into her stomach. She threw them up over X6-88's shoulder as he mounted back onto the ladder and climbed to the surface. "Our doctors shall see to it that your health is restored to pristine condition. Worry not, ma'am." Then, to nobody in particular: "This is X6-88, ready to relay with Nora."  
  
" _NOORRBYYY_!" came a shrill shriek from beyond. Fatigued teal eyes glanced up, barely making out the blurry crimson figure streaking their way -

\- lightning -

\- nothing. _  
  
_  
  
  
  
_  
  
_

 


End file.
